Le lion des Mogols

After leaving Pathé before the end of his contract, Epstein started working instead for Albatros, a company that had become a focal point for Russian émigrés in France. His first work there was a magnificent vehicle for major Albatros star Ivan Mosjoukine. The basic idea for the film also came from Mosjoukine: an adventure story in the Far East about a young palace officer who frees a princess kept imprisoned by Khan, and flees with her into the city. In tackling this exotic subject, Epstein emphasises the fundamental pleasures to be had in popular culture as well as those that lie in the artificial and the constructed—including temporal shifts that anticipate central works such as LA GLACE À TROIS FACES (1927). “A fairy tale for shop girls,” was Henri Langlois’s view of the film, before he immediately went on to defend it: “If one can criticise it, it’s because the film isn’t entirely fantastical, doesn’t contain the surreal realism of the perfect scenes at the jockey club, the taxi race, the masked ball throughout, where montage effects and rhythm aim for a supernatural tone.” (Christoph Huber)

With live music by Elaine Brennan on 20.10. und 19.11.

All retrospective films that will be shown at the Filmmuseum after the Viennale - from 29.10. - can of course also be reserved as usual at filmmuseum.at or by calling 01/533 70 54 and purchased at the box office of the Austrian Film Museum. The prices of the Austrian Film Museum apply.