DER STUDENT VON PRAG

THE STUDENT OF PRAGUE was released in 1913 as one of the great trend-setting German silent films – a pioneering act in many ways and a true “auteur movie.” When Henrik Galeen’s remake came out in 1926, contemporary critics like a writer at Film-Kurier asked a question that sounds familiar today: “Are we really in an era of reprints and new versions of old films?” – only to later qualify the question. Cinema – particularly Weimar Cinema – made enormous leaps in the intervening 13 years with regard to content and, above all, technology. The film puts the story of the poor student Balduin in a new light: ashamed that he can’t offer his beloved enough, he sells his own reflection to the magically gifted Scapinelli. As Galeen noted: “I felt that the original script had not sufficiently exploited the fact of the missing mirror image. Viewers had to ‘see’ more often that Balduin’s reflection was no longer there, before he finally physically appears to us as ‘the other’.” (Der Film, November, 1926) (fw)

Introduction: Florian Widegger (Filmarchiv Austria)