''Downfall'' (German: ''Der Absturz'') is a 1923 German

silent film A silent film is a film without synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, w ...

directed by

Ludwig Wolff Ludwig Wolff (27 September 1857 – 24 February 1919), born in Neustadt in Palatinate, was a German chemist. He studied chemistry at the University of Strasbourg, where he received his Ph.D. from Rudolph Fittig in 1882. He became Professor ...

and starring

Asta Nielsen Asta Sofie Amalie Nielsen (11 September 1881 – 24 May 1972) was a Danish silent film actress who was one of the most popular leading ladies of the 1910s and one of the first international movie stars. Seventy of Nielsen's 74 films were ...

Gregori Chmara Gregori Mikhailovich Chmara ( Ukrainian: Григорій Михайлович Хмара, Russian: Григорий Михайлович Хмара; 29 July 1878 – 3 February 1970) was a Ukrainian-born stage and film actor whose career spanne ...

and Charlotte Schultz.Bock & Bergfelder p.29 The film was produced by Nielsen's own production company. The sets were designed by the

art director Art director is a title for a variety of similar job functions in theater, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, live-action and animated film and television, the Internet, and video games. It is the charge of a sole art director to supe ...

Heinrich Beisenherz. It premiered in

Düsseldorf Düsseldorf is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in the state after Cologne and the List of cities in Germany with more than 100,000 inhabitants, seventh-largest city ...

and had its

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

premiere at the

Marmorhaus The Marmorhaus (English: Marble House) was a movie theater, cinema that used to be located on the Kurfürstendamm in Berlin. Opened in 1913, it takes its name from a large marble façade. Designed by the architect Hugo Pál, the walls of the foyer ...

. The film survives but is missing its first

reel A reel is a tool used to store elongated and flexible objects (e.g. yarns/ cords, ribbons, cables, hoses, etc.) by wrapping the material around a cylindrical core known as a '' spool''. Many reels also have flanges (known as the ''rims'') arou ...

Plot

Kaja Falk is a successful and admired

operetta Operetta is a form of theatre and a genre of light opera. It includes spoken dialogue, songs and including dances. It is lighter than opera in terms of its music, orchestral size, and length of the work. Apart from its shorter length, the oper ...

star, who has been through a lot in her life: The man she loves has to pay for a murder Kaja is suspected to have committed. He accepts the punishment and is sent to jail for ten years. Full of gratitude, Kaja promises her love to stay faithful and wait for him to return. In the following years, he dreams of her every night. In his dreams, she is the young, admirable woman, for whom he took his prison sentence. In reality, the ten years of his absence were not kind to Kaja. When he finally returns, Kaja has aged a lot and is ravaged by disease. Out of prison, he waits for Kaja, who apparently did not come looking for him. But Kaja is there - he just did not recognize the old woman, who wanted to welcome her great love. Shocked and struck by grief, Kaja collapses.

Cast

as Kaja Falk *

as Peter Karsten * Charlotte Schultz as Henrike Thomsen *

Adele Sandrock Adele Sandrock (; 19 August 1863 – 30 August 1937) was a German actress. After a successful theatrical career, she became one of the first German movie stars. Early life Sandrock was born in Rotterdam, Netherlands, the daughter of the German ...

as Mutter Karsten * Albert Bozenhard as Frank Lorris *

Hans Wassmann Hans Wassmann (1 January 1873 – 5 April 1932) was a German film actor.Chandler p.271 Selected filmography * '' Laugh Bajazzo'' (1915) * '' Miss Venus'' (1921) * '' Louise de Lavallière'' (1922) * '' A Glass of Water'' (1923) * '' Nanon'' (1924 ...

as Besucher *

Ivan Bulatov Ivan () is a Slavic male given name, connected with the variant of the Greek name (English: John) from Hebrew meaning 'God is gracious'. It is associated worldwide with Slavic countries. The earliest person known to bear the name was the Bul ...

as Graf Lamotte * Ida Wogau as Kajas Kammerfrau *

Arnold Korff Arnold Peter Kirsch-Korff (2 August 1870 – 2 June 1944) was an Austrian-born American Hollywood actor and director. He appeared in a number of German and Austrian films before moving to the United States and resuming his career in America. He m ...

References

Bibliography

* Hans-Michael Bock and Tim Bergfelder. ''The Concise Cinegraph: An Encyclopedia of German Cinema''. Berghahn Books.

External links

* 1923 films Films of the Weimar Republic Films directed by Ludwig Wolff German silent feature films German black-and-white films {{1920s-Germany-silent-film-stub