Fritz Lang

Friedrich Anton Christian Lang (December 5, 1890 - August 2, 1976) was an Austrian film director, screenwriter and occasional film producer, one of the best known emigrés from Germany's school of expressionism to work in Hollywood. His most famous films are probably the groundbreaking Metropolis (the highest budget of a silent film ever) and M, made before he moved to the United States.

Contents

1 Early life and career 2 The Goebbels myth 3 Metropolis, M and his life in America 4 Lang as a director 5 Late work and death 6 Filmography 7 See also 8 External links

Early life and career

Born in Vienna, Lang grew up as the son of an architect. Both his father and his mother were catholics and so was Lang himself, however unverfied speculations circel around his mother Paula Schlesinger Lang to be of jewish ancentry. Lang first began to study civil engineering at the Technical University of Vienna but was not enthusiastic about it and switched studies to art in 1908. In [1910]]and [1911]] he left Vienna to see the world, starting his travels in Africa and later travelling around Asia and the Pacific area. At the outbreak of the First World War he was drafted into service in the Austrian-Hungarian army and fought in World War I, where he was wounded several times. After recovering from injuries and shell shock he was dischared as lieutenant from the army.

After the war he joined Germany's Ufa studio just as the Expressionist movement was waxing. In this first phase of his career, Lang alternated between art films such as Der Müde Tod (the silent death) and populist thrillers such as Die Spinnen (the spiders) (a two-part film), combining popular genres with Expressionist techniques to create an unprecedented synthesis of popular entertainment with art cinema, culminating in his most famous silent works: Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler (1922), a crime epic (running four hours in two parts in its original version, recently restored by the Munich Filmmuseum) focusing on the psychological conflict between the master criminal Mabuse and detective Von Wenk; Die Nibelungen (1924), and his most famous film, Metropolis (1927).

The Goebbels myth

Many of the stories about Lang's life and career are hard to verify, including perhaps the most famous Lang story of all. The legend has it that Joseph Goebbels called Lang to his offices for a meeting in which he gave Lang two pieces of news: the first was that his most recent film, Das Testament des Dr. Mabuse (The Testament of Dr. Mabuse) was being banned as an incitement to public disorder. The second was that he was nevertheless so impressed by Lang's abilities as a filmmaker, he was offering Lang a position as the head of German film. Lang had been, unbeknownst to Goebbels, already planning to leave Germany for Paris, but the meeting with Goebbels ran so long that the banks were closed by the time it finished, and Lang fled that night without his money, not to return until after the war.

The problem is that many portions of the story cannot be checked, and of those that can, most are contradicted by the evidence. Lang actually left Germany with most of his money, unlike most refugees, and made several return trips later in the same year. There were of course no witnesses to the meeting besides Goebbels and Lang, but Goebbels' appointment books, when they refer to the meeting, only refer to the banning of Testament. No evidence has been discovered in any of Goebbels' writings to affirm the suggestion that he was planning to offer Lang any position. Whatever the truth of this legend, it is known that Lang did in fact leave Germany in 1934 and moved to Paris and later to the United States. His wife Thea von Harbou, who had started to symphatize with the Nazis in the early 1930s and joined the NSDAP in 1932 which led to a divorce in 1933, remained behind.

Metropolis, M and his life in America

Although some consider Lang's work to be simple melodrama, he produced a coherent oeuvre that helped to establish the characteristics of film noir, with its recurring themes of psychological conflict, paranoia, fate and moral ambiguity. His work influenced filmmakers as disparate as Jacques Rivette and William Friedkin.

In 1931, between Metropolis and Das Testament des Dr. Mabuse, Lang directed what many film scholars consider to be his film noir masterpiece: M, a disturbing story of a child murderer (Peter Lorre in his first starring role) who is hunted down and brought to trial by Berlin's criminal underworld. M remains a powerful work; it was remade in 1951 by Joseph Losey, but this version had little impact on audiences, and has become harder to see than the original film.

Upon his arrival in Hollywood, Lang joined the MGM studio and directed the impressive crime drama Fury. He became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1939. Lang made twenty-one features in the next twenty-one years, working in a variety of genres at every major studio in Hollywood, occasionally producing his films as an independent. These films, often compared unfavourably by contemporary critics to Lang's earlier works, have since been reevaluated as the equal of, if not superior to, his German films. During this period, his visual style simplified and his worldview became increasingly pessimistic, culminating in the cold, geometric style of his last American films, While the City Sleeps (1956) and Beyond a Reasonable Doubt (1957).

Lang as a director

Lang epitomized the stereotype of the tyrannical film director such as Alfred Hitchcock or Stanley Kubrick; he was known for being hard to work with. During the climactic final scene in M, he allegedly threw Peter Lorre down a flight of stairs in order to give more authenticity to Lorre's battered look. He wore a monocle that added to the stereotype (though film historians say this particular cliché began with Erich von Stroheim), and his image has been parodied in a number of media, including GWAR's long form video Phallus in Wonderland.

Late work and death

During the 1950s, Lang found it harder to find congenial production conditions in Hollywood and, following a major disagreement with the producer of Beyond A Reasonable Doubt, he returned to Germany to make his last films. These works received mixed reviews, some condemning them as stylised and detached, while others praised them for the same qualities.

Lang's eyesight steadily deteriorated throughout the 1950s and, after a final Dr. Mabuse film, Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse (1960), he returned to the United States. He continued collecting research material and drafting screenplays, but never made another film.

He died in 1976 and was interred in the Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles.

Filmography

• Halbblut (The Half-Caste) (1919)
• Die Spinnen, 1. Teil: Der Goldene See (Spiders, Part 1: The Golden Lake)(1919)
• Harakiri (Madame Butterfly) (1919)
• Die Pest in Florenz (The Plague in Florence) (1919)
• Der Herr der Liebe (Master of Love) (1919)
• Die Spinnen, 2. Teil: Das Brillantenschiff (Spiders, Part 2: The Diamond Ship) (1920)
• Das Wandernde Bild (The Wandering Image) (1920)
• Der müde Tod (Beyond the Wall) (1921)
• Vier um die Frau (Four Around a Woman) (1921)
• Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler (Dr. Mabuse, The Gambler) (1922)
• Die Nibelungen: Siegfried (Die Nibelungen: Siegfried) (1924)
• Die Nibelungen: Kriemhilds Rache (Die Nibelungen: Kriemheld's Revenge) (1924)
• Metropolis (1927)
• Spione (Spies) (1928)
• Frau im Mond (Woman in the Moon) (1929)
• M (1931)
• Das Testament des Dr. Mabuse (The Testament of Dr. Mabuse) (1933)
• Liliom (1934)
• Fury (1936)
• You Only Live Once (1937)
• You and Me (1938)
• The Return of Frank James (1940)
• Western Union (1941)
• Man Hunt (1941)
• Confirm or Deny (1941) (uncredited)
• Moontide (1942) (uncredited)
• Hangmen Also Die (1943)
• Ministry of Fear (1944)
• The Woman in the Window (1944)
• Scarlet Street (1945)
• Cloak and Dagger (1946)
• Secret Beyond the Door (1948)
• House by the River (1950)
• American Guerrilla in the Philippines (1950)
• Rancho Notorious (1952)
• Clash by Night (1952)
• The Blue Gardenia (1953)
• The Big Heat (1953)
• Human Desire (1954)
• Moonfleet (1955)
• While the City Sleeps (1956)
• Beyond a Reasonable Doubt (1957)
• Der Tiger von Eschnapur (The Tiger of Eschnapur, or: The Tiger of Bengal) (1959)
• Das indische Grabmal (The Indian Tomb, or: Journey to the Lost City) (1959)
• Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse (The Thousand Eyes of Dr. Mabuse) (1960)

See also

• List of famous Austrians
• Film noir
• Expressionism
• Metropolis

External links

• Template:Imdb name
• Biographie (http://www.jscheuer.com/lang.htm)
• Senses of Cinema - Biographie (http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/directors/02/lang.html)
• Lang and Metropolis - the first Science Fiction film (http://www.persocom.com.br/brasilia/erika.htm)de:Fritz Lang

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