Paul Rehkopf Movies

Die Sporkc'schen Jaeger (The Sporck Batallion) is where Lt. von Naugaard (Fritz Genschow) calls his home during WWI. A courageous soldier, the lieutenant unfortunately suffers from a mental aberration which compels him to poach on game preserves. Lt. von Naugaard's reckless slaughter of the local deer population casts shame upon his fellow soldiers, but with the help of the poor man's superior officer, all is set right. To non-German eyes, the central conflict in Die Sporkc'schen Jaeger may seem like much ado about nothing. Of far more interest is the romance between von Naugaard and the apple-cheeked heroine (Reva Holsey). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The "gipfelsturmer" ("mountain conqueror") of the title is Franzl, played by Olympic mountain-climbing champion Franz Schmid. Since Schmid's climbing prowess is the film's sole raison d'etre, there isn't very much of a plot. This hardly mattered, since audiences were enthralled by the seemingly authentic footage of Schmid performing his high-and-dizzy specialty somewhere in the Alps. Only on second and third viewings is one aware that some of the close shots were re-created within the safe environs of a film studio. Oddly, Der Gipfelsturmer ends with Schmid reaching the top of the mountain, leaving the audience to scratch its collective head in wonderment as to how he's going to get down. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Letzte Rose (The Last Rose) was adapted from Frederich von Flotow's opera Martha. Set in a very Teutonic-looking England, the story concerns a royal lady-in-waiting named Harriet (Carla Spletter) who is promised in marriage to an aristocrat, Lord Tristan (Georg Alexander). Alas, Harriet has fallen in love with humble peasant Lyonel (Helge Rosenwange). All seems lost for Harriet and Lyonel until Queen Elizabeth unexpectedly rules that the English peasants are now permitted to be landowners, putting Lyonel on equal footing with the huffy Tristan. Considering the fact that the film deals in individual personalities, it's surprising that most of the musical highlights in Letzte Rose are group production numbers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Fritz Lang directed this sequel to his nearly four-hour Dr. Mabuse silent of 1922 (often shown in two parts, Dr. Mabuse: Der Spieler/The Gambler and Dr. Mabuse: King of Crime). The film opens with Detective Hofmeister (Karl Meixner) spying on the activities of a criminal syndicate. Not realizing he has been seen, Hofmeister is attacked by the thugs and later turns up out of his mind. He is placed in the institution of Professor Baum (Oscar Beregi), who becomes increasingly obsessed with another patient -- the master criminal and hypnotist Dr. Mabuse (Rudolf Klein-Rogge). Baum's assistant, Dr. Kramm (Theodor Loos), connects Mabuse's writings to a series of the syndicate's recent criminal activities, and is murdered for his knowledge by crime lord Hardy (Rudolf Schündler) who takes orders from a hidden Mabuse. Putting all these pieces together is chief investigator Lohmann (Otto Wernicke), whose story plays out simultaneously with that of ex-cop Thomas Kent (Gustav Diessl), a member of the gang who is torn between his need for money and his love for a young woman named Lilli (Wera Liessem). Various clues lead Lohmann to suspect Mabuse's involvement, but when he arrives at the asylum, Baum reveals that Mabuse has died. Meanwhile, Kent's decision to confess to the cops lands himself and Lilli in a room with a hidden bomb. Lohmann traps the gang in a moll's house, leading to a wild shootout. Kent and Lilli escape and race to Lohmann to tell him that Mabuse is behind the crimes. They all race back to the asylum where they discover that Mabuse has taken control of Baum, who sets a monstrous fire at a chemical factory. The mad doctor then leads Lohmann and Kent on a wild car chase back to the asylum where the mystery behind the Baum-Mabuse-Hofmeister connection takes a disturbing turn. ~ Patrick Legare, All Movie Guide

False Field-Marshal is the English-language title of this German military comedy. Vlasta Burian stars as Buschceck, a former WWI soldier who dreams of returning to uniform. He gets his wish when circumstances oblige him to impersonate a missing field marshal. Our hero has a high old time issuing orders until the genuine field marshal (who fortunately has a good sense of humor) finally shows up. Based on a play by A. Longens, the basic premise of Falscher Feldmarschall resurfaced 26 years later in the MGM war-time comedy Imitation General. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Der Zinker (To Squeal) was based on The Squeaker, a mystery play by Edgar Wallace. The hero is a Scotland Yard detective who poses as an ex-convict. It's all part of a strategy to capture a notorious and elusive fence known as "The Squeaker," who cloaks his criminal activities behind a facade of charitable respectability. Evidently, this German adaptation ran far afield of the Wallace original, since its plot was disjointed and its character motivations unbelievable. An English-language version of The Squeaker, directed by Wallace himself, was released in 1930. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Producer/director D.W. Griffith's feature is a fairly realistic study of the deprivations visited on the German people after their defeat in World War I. In her best-ever performance, Griffith protégée Carol Dempster plays Inga, who does her best to hold her family together and keep food on the table despite grinding poverty, debilitating illness and out-of-control inflation. The most memorable scene finds Inga desperately trying to maneuver a basketful of near-worthless Deutschmarks to a market before the prices rise again and she is unable to buy meat. Aware that anti-German sentiment still prevailed in the US, Griffith cannily inserted an opening title which noted that the main characters were Polish. A further title explains that "The Story is laid in Germany only because the conditions there were most suitable to show the struggle of love over hardship." Filmed on location in Germany, Isn't Life Wonderful sentimentalizes things just a tad towards the end, but otherwise remains an uncompromising forerunner of the semi-documentary European "street" dramas of the late 1920s and early 1930s. Alas, the film failed completely at the box office, ending D.W. Griffith's career as an independent producer (he would continue to direct, but only as a "hired hand" for various studios). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide