1920s Berlin - Movies About 1920s Berlin

Movies About 1920s Berlin

The following significant films about 1920s Berlin show the metropolis between 1920 and 1933 (until the Nazi takeover of power):

• Dr. Mabuse the Gambler, 1922 - first (silent) film about the character Doctor Mabuse from the novels of Norbert Jacques, by Fritz Lang
• The Last Laugh, 1924 - the aging doorman at a Berlin hotel is demoted to washroom attendant but gets the last laugh, by F.W. Murnau
• Slums of Berlin (Die Verrufenen), 1925 - an engineer in Berlin is released from prison, but his father throws him out, his fiancée left him and there is no chance to find work. Directed by Gerhard Lamprecht.
• Die letzte Droschke von Berlin, 1926 - showing the life of an old coachman in Berlin still driving the droshky during the time when the automobile arises. Directed by Carl Boese.
• Berlin: Symphony of a Great City, 1927 - expressionist documentary film of 1920s Berlin by Walter Ruttmann
• Refuge (Zuflucht), 1928 - a lonely and tired man comes home after several years abroad, lives with a market-woman in Berlin and starts working for the Berlin U-Bahn. Directed by Carl Froelich.
• Asphalt, 1929 - the Berlin underworld touches a policeman's life, Film Noir classic by Joe May
• Mutter Krausens Fahrt ins Glück, 1929 - depicts the cruelty of poverty in Wedding district and Communism as a rescuing force that reaches a mother and a child too late. Directed by Phil Jutzi.
• People on Sunday, 1930 - Avant-garde look at daily life in Berlin, screenplay by Billy Wilder and Curt Siodmak
• Symphonie einer Weltstadt (Berlin - Wie es war), 1930 - documentary view of Berlin by Leo de Laforgue. First showed in 1950.
• Die drei von der Tankstelle, 1930 - three friends are broke, so they sell their car and open a filling station in Berlin. The film shows the rising level of motorisation in Germany. Directed by Wilhelm Thiele.
• Cyankali, 1930 - a poor female office employee in Berlin gets pregnant, but abortion is not allowed in the Weimar Republic. So she goes to a quack doctor who applies toxic potassium cyanide to her. Directed by Hans Tintner.
• Emil and the Detectives, 1931 - the Adventure film based on the novel Emil and the Detectives by Erich Kästner shows Berlin from children's point of view. Director: Gerhard Lamprecht.
• M, 1931 - Berlin thriller by Fritz Lang; beginnings of film noir and the endings of expressionism
• Berlin-Alexanderplatz, 1931 - first film adaption of the novel Berlin Alexanderplatz from Alfred Döblin, directed by Phil Jutzi
• Looking for His Murderer (Der Mann, der seinen Mörder sucht), 1931 - a man in Berlin plunged in debt does not succeed in committing suicide and has to hire a murderer to kill him within twelve hours. But in the same night he falls in love with a girl who wants to stop the appointed killer. Directed by Robert Siodmak.
• Grand Hotel, 1932 - showing the life of permanent residents in a Berlin Hotel. Directed by Edmund Goulding. Academy Award for Best Picture (1931–1932).
• Kuhle Wampe, 1932 - about a working-class family in Berlin in 1931 where survival is difficult during the Great Depression. Directed by Slatan Dudow.
• Rotation, 1949 - showing the life of a working-class family in Berlin between 1920 and 1945, from the Great Depression over the Third Reich until the Battle of Berlin. Directed by Wolfgang Staudte.
• The Beaverskin (Die Buntkarierten), 1949 - the fate of a typical working class family in Berlin between 1883 and 1949 facing child labour, trade union engagement, war, depression, unemployment and the rise and fall of Nazism. Directed by Kurt Maetzig.
• Der eiserne Gustav, 1958 - based on the novel by Hans Fallada and telling the true story of horse-drawn cabman Gustav Hartmann from Wannsee district who drove sensationally to Paris in 1928 to demonstrate against the rise of the motorcar taxicab. Directed by George Hurdalek.
• Wolf unter Wölfen, 1964 - the four-part movie based on the novel Wolf Among Wolves by Hans Fallada describes the Hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic in 1923 which led to widespread unemployment, homelessness, starvation and rioting in Berlin. Directed by Hans-Joachim Kasprzik.
• Ganovenehre, 1966 - comedy about the panderer and crime environment in 1925 Berlin. Directed by Wolfgang Staudte.
• Cabaret, 1972 - set in the early 1930s depicting Weimar Berlin from the writings of Christopher Isherwood; film by Bob Fosse
• Memories of Berlin: The Twilight of Weimar Culture, 1976 - Documentary about Berlin's cultural scene during the Weimar Republic, by Gary Conklin
• Schöner Gigolo, armer Gigolo, 1978 - a Prussian officer returns home to Berlin following the end of World War I. Unable to find employment elsewhere, he works as a gigolo in a brothel run by a Baroness; by David Hemmings.
• Pinselheinrich, 1979 - episodes from the life of famous Berlin illustrator Heinrich Zille. Zille gets dismissed from his work, starts to live from his funny and socially critical drawings but uses his earnings and rising fame to help people who are poorer than him. Directed by Hans Knötzsch.
• Berlin Alexanderplatz, 1980 - elaborate film of the novel written by Alfred Döblin. Made for television (in many parts) by Rainer Werner Fassbinder.
• Claire Berolina, 1987 - portrait of Claire Waldoff who became a famous cabaret singer in 1920s Berlin and was close friends with composer Walter Kollo, writer Kurt Tucholsky and illustrator Heinrich Zille. She was an important part of cultural and lesbian life in Berlin until the Nazi Machtergreifung ended her success. Directed by Klaus Gendries.
• Kai aus der Kiste, 1988 - during the hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic 1923 in Berlin a boy and his friends start a campaign of competitive advertising for an American chewing gum brand and use the resources of the metropolis for it. Based upon the novel by Wolf Durian and directed by Günter Meyer.
• Invincible, 2001 - the true story of a Jewish strongman in 1932 Berlin by Werner Herzog
• Love in Thoughts (Was nützt die Liebe in Gedanken), 2004 - about the so-called Steglitz student tragedy in 1927, when two young men made a suicide pact under the influence of alcohol, music and sex, which lead to a tragedy. Directed by Achim von Borries.

See also: List of films set in Berlin