The dead live

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Movie
Original title The dead live
Country of production Germany
original language German
Publishing year 1914
length approx. 58 minutes
Rod
Director Walter Schmidthässler
script based on a novel
production Paul Davidson
Jules Greenbaum
occupation
  • Walter Schmidthässler: painter Schrader
  • Hedda Vernon : Elma Schrader, his daughter (assignment uncertain)
  • unknown actor: Heinz Schrader, his son

Die Toten Leben is a German silent film drama from 1914 by and with Walter Schmidthässler .

action

The family is very happy in the house of the portrait painter Schrader. The parents are proud of their young, pretty daughter Elma. Many young men are interested in her, but Elma has long since given her heart to someone else: Dr. Kruger, who serves as a personal physician to a duke. One day the medic asked for Elma's hand. At the same time, the Schrader family is expected to return home for their son Heinz, who is serving as a lieutenant at sea and is now on home leave. A letter reaches his parents. It says that the return home will be delayed by two days, as Heinz wanted to visit his friend Baron Feldau in Berlin to make it with him. With sparkling wine and good food in the restaurant, the women are looked after and flirted with them. A waiter brings Feldau a short message from a restaurant guest sitting a little further away, a certain Baron Liebenau. He invites the two men to a birthday party. During this festival, several men sit down at the table and start gambling. If Heinz still laughs Fortuna at the beginning, the young officer soon begins to lose more and more, until finally all his cash is gone.

Days later, painter Schrader received his son returning home with great warmth. His pride in the son who made it to be a handsome officer is limitless. Suddenly the Duke's court marshal appears and asks the painting professor to see his latest creation, “The Loreley”, as his noble superior wants to purchase the portrait. While the two men examine the painting, Heinz confesses his enormous gambling debts to his mother. Father Schrader arrives and thinks he can't believe his ears when he learns about the sum: 5,000 marks! The father is stunned, makes serious reproaches to the son and rules at him: "See how you deal with it!". The court marshal has meanwhile left again, and Prof. Schrader returns to the money from the sale of the “Loreley”. But that suddenly disappeared! It is exactly 5000 marks. Of course, the son who protests his innocence comes under suspicion. Schrader didn't believe a word he said and expelled him from the house. Not only does Heinz leave his parents' home behind, he even leaves the country and subsequently leads a dreary life abroad.

The painter Schrader cannot get over the nagging thought that his son is a common thief. He gets mad about that over time. When the gardener of the Schrader family was dying a year later, Mrs. Schrader was asked to see him. On his deathbed, he confesses to having taken the banknotes back then. With the last of his strength, he takes the wad of money out of hiding and hands it over to the landlady. The reports excited her husband about the new knowledge. The old man now believes that his son Heinz must be dead. Neither the sight of the bills nor the confirmation that the son was always innocent left any impression on the confused painter. Meanwhile, Heinz has had a difficult time and had to get by with odd jobs. He last worked as a waiter in Naples. He was scared to death one day when he discovered the Duke and his court marshal among the guests in the Neapolitan restaurant. With trembling hands he serves the gentlemen, who of course recognize him and learn of his suffering. Together they decide to go back home as soon as possible, also to help the confused father Schrader.

Hardly having arrived home, Elma's fiancé Dr. Kruger to let Schrader get well again. The doctor finds that the old man can only be brought back to the living with shock therapy that shakes his emotional world. Night after night the old man sneaks out of the bedroom and positions himself in front of a life-size portrait of his prodigal son. Krüger has the idea to cut out the portrait and instead show the person Heinz in his splendid uniform. Schrader comes to the picture of Heinz again, but this time it moves. Heinz waves to him and even comes towards the old man. The dead live! This shock therapy helps, and father and son are in each other's arms with the joy of seeing each other again. The overwhelming emotion brings Prof. Schrader back to mind, and the family can dare a new beginning.

Production notes

Die Toten Leben was created in the spring of 1914 in the Vitascope studio in Berlin-Weißensee . The three-act act was 1060 meters long and was probably premiered in 1914.

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