Young Irmgard (Mia May), through the clandestine help of her lover’s brother (I think it’s the brother, anyway… bit hard to be sure in this, the only existent truncated cut of the film) falsifies a marriage certificate after having a child without her lover’s knowledge, all because he (Hans Marr, playing both brother roles, helping further confuse things in the cut… though I think I have it all straight, as the new subtitles work hard to remove the ambiguity) is a radical philosopher and doesn’t believe in wedlock, refusing to marry her. Things soon fall apart as the lover dies and the suddenly nefarious brother, as well as a cousin (introducing that legendary Lang presence from his German years, Rudolf Klein-Rogge, who would go on to essay in mad genius style not just the original Mabuse, but the fevered inventor Rotwang in the scifi classic Metropolis… I mean, this guy is as important as Lang in what those films have become as far as I can see) each begin greedily vying for the inheritance. Consumed with guilt at what she’s done and despairing over the loss of her love, Irmgard tries to disappear, with the two men hot on her trail, into the vast and wintry mountains… only to be saved by someone who looks just like her husband (and her brother, for that matter)…

An early effort of Lang’s, coming just after his two-part, over four hour long international espionage action/adventure serial-like The Spiders, Das Wandernde Bild feels more like a work for hire for the filmmaker, as well as for his frequent collaborator and co-writer Thea Von Harbou, who was still married to Klein at this point, soon to leave him for Lang, even though the three continued to reach great filmic heights together (ah, only in the movies). A new credit introduction reveals the film was considered lost, until a severely shortened version, edited down for South American release (missing 2 or 3 reels), was found in 1986 in Brazil and restored.

As melodrama it’s perhaps a bit simplistic, yet the flashback structure of revealing information (the film starting on Irmgard’s escape with the two men separately following, with scenes from the past interspersed revealing the reasons why), if not being particularly novel (from today’s perspective anyway, though perhaps it might have even been considered innovate back in 1920), does manage to keep the interest raised just enough. Lang makes some impressive use of the vast wintery mountaintops, adding an effective almost mystical quality, to the point where they almost feel as if they come from a different time and place from the rest of the film (apparently stories set in the mountains were popular in Germany at the time, including by the notorious and brilliant filmmaker, and eventual Nazi propagandist, Leni Riefenstahl herself). The brief avalanche scenes (with the bad brother trying to dynamite Irmgard, who he has decided is more valuable dead at this point) aren’t as ambitious in their scale as Lang would often go, but they remain impressive enough… and the almost quasi-Christ like reveal of the dead husband’s visage is evocative (in that overtly Langian sense).

Where some of his early Hollywood work focused on the effects of characters being trapped within the manipulations of the law as a way to express social issues, with Das Wandernde Bild Lang (and Harbou) are less interested in exploring the effects of the repressive (essentially patriarchal) structures used to control the female character (which he did, in fact, explore more in depth just the year before in Harakiri, his adaption of “Madame Butterfly”, which I’ll be writing about next), but more on the melodrama present in her suffering and final salvation.

It’s not his best effort, by any means, but worth a look, as you can see some of the early impressive visuals from a madman genius filmmaker beginning to take form (incredibly fully realized just two years later by perhaps his first masterpiece, the first Mabuse film). On top of that, Das Wandernde Bild led to Klein-Rogge’s filmic introduction to Lang… a match of inspiration that would lead to cinematic immortality. That in itself is more than enough to appreciate the film for.

Buck A Review   fritz lang   german cinema   german mountain films   rudolf klein-rogge