Variety (1925 film)

1925 film

Screenwriter:

Ewald Andre Dupont
Leo Birinski

Based onThe Oath of Stephan Huller by Felix HollaenderProduced byErich PommerStarring

Emil Jannings
Lya de Putti
Maly Delschaft
Warwick Ward

Cinematography

Karl W. Freund
Carl Hoffmann

Distributed by

UFA (Germany)
Paramount Pictures (US)

Release dates

16 November 1925 (Germany)
27 June 1926 (US)

Languages

Silent film
German intertitles

Variety (German: Varieté [ˌvaʀi̯eˈte], also known by the alternative titles Jealousy or Vaudeville) is a 1925 German silent drama film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont based on the 1912 novel The Oath of Stephan Huller by Felix Hollaender.^[1]

The trapeze scenes are set in the Berlin Wintergarten theatre. The camera swings from long shot to close-up, like the acrobats.^[2]

The story was loosely remade by Dupont as the 1931 German sound film Salto Mortale.

Plot

In the film, Jannings portrays "Boss Huller", a former trapeze artist who was badly injured in a fall from the high wire and who now runs a seedy carnival with his wife (Maly Delschaft) and their child. Huller insists that the family take in a beautiful stranger (Lya De Putti) as a new sideshow dancer, with whom he develops a new trapeze number. He falls in love with the new star, and the story ends in tragedy.

Cast

Emil Jannings as Boss Huller
Maly Delschaft as wife of Boss
Lya De Putti as Bertha
Warwick Ward as Artinelli
Georg John

Release

The film was heavily censored when it was released in the United States (except for New York) by excising the entire first reel, "thus destroying the motivation of the tragedy, implying that the acrobat was married to his Eurasian temptress."^[3]

Influence

The film is noted for its innovative camerawork with highly expressive movement through space, accomplished by the expressionist cinematographer Karl Freund.^[4]

Decades later, the German director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck cites being unexpectedly exposed to the film as a child of four as the start of his interest in the medium.^[5]

This film is believed to contain the first documentation of unicycle hockey – it features a short sequence showing two people playing the game.

References

^ Katalog der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek listing. Retrieved 8 December 2010.
^ Eric, Rhode (1985). A History of the Cinema: from its origins to 1970. New York, USA: Da Capo Press. pp. 184–185. ISBN 978-0-306-80233-1.
^ Morris Ernst and Pare Lorentz, (1930). Censored: The Private Life of the Movie, New York: Jonathan Cape. p. 12.
^ Kristin Thompson. Youtube commentary for Varieté. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4Tov1vgoVI
^ Rohter, Larry, "German Director Plunges Beyond His Comfort Zone", The New York Times, 8 December 2010 (9 December 2010 p. C1 NY ed.). Retrieved 8 December 2010.