Alraune
Mandrágora
1928 · Germany · 108 min
- Director
- Henrik Galeen
- Screenplay
- Henrik Galeen
- Producer
- Helmuth Schreiber
- Music
- Willy Schmidt-Gentner
- Cinematography
- Franz Planer
- Based on
- Alraune
Cast
What it is about
A wealthy professor who specializes in genetics plans an experiment with a woman of low social standing and asks his young nephew Franz to find her. The child who results, Alraune, grows into a seductive young woman who upends everyone around her. Across boarding schools, journeys and gambling halls, the story traces the increasingly dark bond between her and the man who raises her as a daughter.
How it was made
Henrik Galeen directed and wrote the film, based on the novel by Hanns Heinz Ewers. Helmuth Schreiber produced, Franz Planer shot the photography and Willy Schmidt-Gentner composed the music. Brigitte Helm leads a cast that includes Paul Wegener, Valeska Gert and Iván Petrovich. The result blends horror, science fiction and a sexuality that was very bold for its time, with an atmosphere critics singled out.
Reception and legacy
It premiered in Berlin on 20 January 1928. The New York Times praised Galeen's visual imagination and Helm's commanding performance, comparing her to the great Hollywood vamps. Decades later, Troy Howarth considered it the director's most impressive work after The Student of Prague, and Phil Hardy judged it the best of the five adaptations of the legend.
Stills
Trivia
A different name in the United States
In American release prints, the character was renamed Mandrake, the English word for Alraune.
Sound remake
Brigitte Helm reprised the role two years later in Richard Oswald's 1930 sound remake.
Surviving copy
A copy of the film is held by George Eastman House.
More films by Henrik Galeen
The Golem
The Student of Prague
The Love Letters of Baroness SOriginal Cinematopedia text based on Wikipedia (en) and Wikidata.