Maze of passion
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Maze of Passion (Austria: The Garden of Lust) |
| Original title | The Pleasure Garden |
| Country of production | Great Britain , Germany |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1925 |
| length | 82 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Alfred Hitchcock |
| script | Eliot Stannard |
| production |
Michael Balcon for Gainsborough Pictures , Erich Pommer for Münchner Lichtspielkunst AG |
| music | Lee Irwin |
| camera | Gaetano di Ventimiglia |
| cut | Alma Reville |
| occupation | |
| |
Maze of Passion is a German-British silent film by Alfred Hitchcock from 1925, based on the novel The Pleasure Garden by Oliver Sandys . It is the director's first complete feature film; the film Number 13 from 1922 remained unfinished due to the bankruptcy of the studio at the time.
action
After a performance, revue dancer Patsy Brand meets Jill Cheyne in front of the theater, who hopes to get a job as a dancer with a letter of recommendation. Patsy takes Jill into her apartment because both the letter and the wallet have been stolen from Jill and she can therefore not afford accommodation. Jill goes to the theater to audition the next day. She gets an engagement and gradually rises to become a solo dancer. One day, Jill's fiancé Hugh Fielding comes to visit, who, together with his friend and colleague Levet, will go "east" for professional reasons in order to earn enough money to marry Jill. It becomes clear to him that Jill has an admirer in Prince Ivan, among others, through her new job, but Patsy reassures him with the promise to take care of Jill.
Jill moves out of Patsy's home; Meanwhile, Prince Ivan spoils her with expensive gifts. Fielding's friend Levet, who has come on vacation from the east, marries Patsy and they spend their honeymoon in the Villa d'Este on Lake Como . When he leaves, he is no longer interested in her - a local woman is waiting for him when he returns to the tropics. Hugh learns about Jill's romance from the newspaper.
After many weeks, Patsy receives a first letter from Levet in which he cites a fever as the reason for his silence. She drives to him immediately to take care of him, but does not announce her arrival. She finds him in the arms of a local, leaves him in an argument and goes to Hugh. This is actually sick; in the fever he initially thinks she is Jill. Levet has meanwhile drowned his local lover, and he takes Patsy back. Visions of the dead haunt him at night. He is shot dead when he is mad about to pounce on Patsy with a saber. Patsy meets Hugh.
History of origin
After Hitchcock worked for Gainsborough Pictures as an assistant director, producer Michael Balcon assigned him the first directorial work in 1925. Since no financier could be found for the film by an unknown directorial debutante in England, Maze of Passion was co-produced by the German Münchner Lichtspielkunst (Emelka) and Hitchcock was sent to Germany to film. Screenwriter was Elliot Stannard , who should write the books for seven of Hitchcock's nine silent films by 1928. The small staff were mainly Hitchcock, who had to take care of many small things in addition to directing, and Alma Reville , who worked as a film editor and assistant director on the film and became Hitchcock's wife in 1926, as well as the cameraman Gaetano di Ventimiglia. Current stars were hired from Hollywood.
The outdoor shots took place in Italy in the summer of 1925 and the indoor shots in the Munich Emelka studios in Geiselgasteig . Filming reflected Hitchcock's inexperience and was bumpy. The story of this filming was one of Hitchcock's fond anecdotes. Problems such as the theft of cash, the near-seizure of the film material by customs and unforeseen costs by the rather demanding American actors had to be mastered. While Hitchcock was able to solve the financial problems with the help of Alma Reville and with a lot of improvisation, the 26-year-old, who was brought up by Jesuits, learned how you did it later in the legendary interview with Mr. Hitchcock. with François Truffaut told about the female menstruation for the first time during the filming , when an actress could not shoot a scene in which she was supposed to jump into the water.
Premiere and reviews
The German premiere - and thus the first public performance of an Alfred Hitchcock film - took place on November 3, 1925 in Munich. In England, however, the premiere should be delayed. Michael Balcon was enthusiastic, and the film received consistently positive reviews after a press screening in March 1926. The magazine Bioscop wrote: “The story has been brought to the screen well. Admirable performance and a masterly production performance combine to create an extraordinary film. (...) The drama captivates until the last minute. (...) This first production by Alfred Hitchcock promises a lot for the future. ” However, the distributor and financier CM Woolf was less enthusiastic . He could not do much with the stylistic devices typical of the German silent film of the 1920s, such as playing with light and shadow or unusual camera perspectives and with the rather American-looking narrative style, and did not want to publish the film. Therefore the British theatrical release was postponed by almost a year. Maze of Passion was only shown publicly in London in January 1927, after Hitchcock had already made two more films for Balcon with The Mountain Eagle and The Tenant .
literature
- Oliver Sandys: The Pleasure Garden . Hurst & Blackett, London 1923, 283 pp. (No German translation exists yet)