Was ist Liebe skilfully blends moments of intense drama with far lighter scenes, offering us, as a whole, an intense portrait of humanity with all its countless facets. Restored by Filmarchiv Austria and presented on the Filmarchiv On channel.
The Hands of Orlac stands out as one of the most important post-expressionist films, with a strong horror component and a character reminiscent of even the most modern international detective stories. Robert Wiene once again made history.
1924, the year in which The City without Jews was filmed and for the first time screened to the audience, is a crucial year. Only a few months later, in fact, Adolf Hitler will publish Mein Kampf, giving rise to feelings that had remained, until then, (not too) dormant. The author of the novel – Hugo Bettauer, who, here, also collaborated with Breslauer and Ida Jenbach on the screenplay – had already portrayed two years earlier one of the many possible consequences of this latent resentment. And he had done so in perhaps the most disturbing of all ways: satire.