The Holy Lie (1927)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The holy lie |
| Country of production | German Empire |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1927 |
| length | 88 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Holger-Madsen |
| script | Bobby E. Lüthge |
| production | Carl Boese |
| music | Werner Richard Heymann |
| camera | Karl Hasselmann |
| occupation | |
| |
The holy lie is a German silent film drama from 1927 by Holger-Madsen with Otto Fee , Sybill Morel and Margarete Schlegel in the leading roles. The story is based on the novel of the same name by Karin Michaëlis .
action
The blind woman Lind lives alone on the coast of Denmark. All of her children have emigrated overseas, and every now and then she receives a letter with a few dollar bills on it so that the mother can have things a little easier at home. The most beautiful stories are told in the letters: the son-in-law is a famous ophthalmologist, the unmarried daughter is a talented and sought-after piano teacher, one of the sons is employed by Thomas Alva Edison's factory and is pursuing a career there as an engineer. The other son writes that he owns a huge farm in Canada. Mother leans back happy and satisfied and sees in the spirit of her little village street the glitter and flashing of Broadway in New York as the epitome of prosperity and success.
But all of this is just a big lie, a “holy lie” that the children serve for the mother's sake, so that she can spend her retirement years in a spiritually intact state. The reality of the children is diametrically opposed: Housing on the 30th floor of a ramshackle American city apartment through which the rainwater runs. The ophthalmologist just barely gets by with the few dollars his patients pay him. In order to survive, the “talented piano teacher” has to hit the keys to the hammering jazz sounds of a bad reputation bar, with guests smoking and scuffling as decorative accessories. The alleged rich farm owner is a poor convict who has taken on theft, committed by his sister out of sheer need, and is now grumbling behind bars in striped clothes. What remains is Edison's “successful” employee: He is laboring as a blacksmith on an anvil.
When mother Lind regains her eyesight, she naturally wants to travel to North America immediately to see the great “successes” in the lives of her children. In the mistaken belief that the mother is still blind, the old life lies are continued and lots of Potemkin villages are set in front of them in order to continue to give the mother good feelings. But she sees the misery in which the children live and is at the same time happy to know that it takes great love of the children for her to make such an effort to spare her own mother any agony. As in a fairy tale, everything finally turns out for the better: A rich friend appears like a saving angel for the descendants, and the not quite fresh captain Uwe Möller appears, marries Mrs. Lind's youngest daughter and brings them both back home in Denmark back.
Production notes
The holy lie was made in May and June 1927 in the National Film Atelier in Berlin-Tempelhof and passed the film censorship on July 25, 1927. The film was 2210 meters long, divided into seven acts. The premiere took place on September 2, 1927 in Berlin's UFA-Palast am Zoo .
Max Knaake created the film structures, Ernst Körner took over the production management .
criticism
The Neue Freue Presse called the film simply a “film of mother and child love”.
Individual evidence
- ↑ "The Holy Lie". In: Neue Freie Presse , March 10, 1928, p. 8 (online at ANNO ).
Web links
- The holy lie in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The holy lie at filmportal.de