DR MABUSE, THE GAMBLER (Fritz Lang, 1922)
(Directed by Fritz Lang from a script by Lang and Thea Von Harbou based on the original novel by Norbert Jaques. Starring Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Aud Egede-Nissen, Gertrude Welcker, Alfred Abel, Bernard Goetzke, and Paul Richter. Released 27 April 1922 (part one) and 26 May 1922 (part two); watched 2023w34 via Kino Blu-Ray)
FritzFest thus begins: this first viewing of DR MABUSE, THE GAMBLER being the start (to be followed by a first of DIE NIBELUNGEN, a rewatch of METROPOLIS, a first of SPIES, a rewatch of M, and an inaugural of TESTAMENT OF DR MABUSE – on Criterion Channel not, unfortunately, as with the others, on Blu - yet - though it might be if I have a region-free Blu player. Do I? Mem: check).
Happy that I was able to watch MABUSE not only as a 270-minute, two-film historical document, as a template for pretty much every great villain since – Ledger's Joker, among many others – but as the compulsively watchable, exhilarating tapestry of fascinating – and devastating, especially the Tolds and Carozza – characters at the mercy of the ruthless, titular force of nature played with mad-scientist-mold-defining aplomb by the great Rudolf Klein-Rogge, whose capture at the conclusion of Lang's four and a half hour epic is an epic in and of itself, a firefight wrapped in gunsmoke and sewer escape devolving into entrapped madness, a template for all great action denouements to come: THE THIRD MAN, HEAT and countless others, off the top of my head.
MABUSE’s true power is, like all of Lang's films, that it remains – in spite of being the century-old mold-forming work that it is – first and foremost a ripping yarn, a rare feat that exemplifies one of Lang's great hallmarks: his works always feel as though they were released yesterday – though some, like MABUSE, were released more than a century of yesterdays ago.
Highly, highly recommended.
