A cabaret singer entrusts her illegitimate daughter to a country doctor but doesn't say which of three friends of his is the father. Rumors are spread and relationships are strained until one man admits the truth.

1939 film by Hans Deppe

The dancer Lena Schmidt wins ten thousand mark at the lottery. With the money she leaves for a fashionable resort. Lena meets there the penniless painter Gustav Lindner, who is looking for a rich wife.

In this convoluted melodrama, an elderly thespian falls for a rising young starlet. He admits his love for her and then announces that he will retire. The young woman pretends she loves him too, but her real motive is to give her struggling lover, also an aspiring actor, a break.

'Love and the First Railway' is what this movie's title would mean in English. This is one of those films that depicts fictional characters participating in an historic incident. The actual first railway was built in England, of course. But according to this movie, the first railway (in Germany, at least) was built from Berlin to Potsdam, in 1838. I haven't the faintest idea if that's correct, but the people who made this movie do seem to take a great deal of interest in historical accuracy, so I'll take their word for it. Anyway, a title at the beginning establishes that this movie is set in 1838.

Der Berliner Reitlehrer Günther Nordmann lernt während eines Skiurlaubs die attraktive Bauerntochter Monika kennen. Es funkt sofort zwischen den beiden - Günther ist gefesselt von der Natürlichkeit des Schwarzwaldmädels, Monika ist fasziniert von den weltmännischen Umgangsformen Günthers. Das junge Paar verlobt sich, doch kurz darauf muß Günther zurück nach Berlin, wo er im Reitinstitut ...

一部給低估了的傑作，鑑於前作被指離經叛道，劉別謙改拍童話式故事，拍出令德國人瞠目結舌的格調與清新幽默感，論者認為它比《卡里加里醫生的密室》更應名垂青史（兩片其實是雙生兒，只是主角一個作惡一個行善）。不肯成長的男孩被叔父強迫娶妻，玩具大王借女兒的模樣造出機械公仔，演出一幕騙婚記，但竟弄假成真。幕開只見我們的導演跑出來，用紙板砌出人與物，接着疊現真實畫面。戲演下去，所有場景透視詭異，道具有時索性繪在牆上。全片優美且自由奔放，活像頑童開心炮製的藝術品。值得一看的還有德國默片女星奧茜奧華黛的傳奇身影。 Proceeding The Cabinet of Dr Caligari by one year, this is both vintage early Lubitsch with its sly slapstick and Rabelaisian humour, and the only work that shares the subliminal, hallucinatory style of German expressionism. He exhibits a blinding array of camera effects, like an astounding shot of a dozen images of mouths in one frame. Also ahead of his time is an opening scene with Lubitsch himself constructing a miniature stage contraption that becomes the film set. A Pirandelloesque concept of art and artifice informs the Hoffman-inspired story about a man who purchases a life-sized doll to stand in for a bride. He gets more than he bargained for - the owner's daughter pretending to be doll! Source: 28th HKIFF