🚫entfällt:Stummfilm mit Live-Musik: „Faust“
17. März “Faust“ 1926, 106 Minuten, Murnau
Musik am Steinway-FlĂĽgel: KMD Peter-Michael Seifried
Film und Musik: Eintritt frei
Basierend auf Motiven des Goethe-Klassikers erzählt der Film die Geschichte des Gelehrten Faust, der von Mephisto in Versuchung geführt wird. Mephisto hatte nämlich in einem Streit mit dem Erzengel Gabriel behauptet, er könne jeden Menschen vom Weg Gottes abbringen. Um den alten Faust zu verführen, lässt Mephisto das Land von der Pest heimsuchen; da die sterbenden Menschen den Gelehrten um Hilfe anflehen und dieser trotz seiner Gebete keine Hilfe von Gott erhält, sucht er Rat beim Teufel. Um ihn für sich zu gewinnen, verspricht Mephisto Faust die ewige Jugend und alle Schätze dieser Welt. Faust lässt sich auf den Pakt ein und verschreibt damit seine Seele dem Teufel. Fortan muss Mephisto ihm alle Wünsche erfüllen.
Als Mephisto und Faust eines Tages in dessen Heimatstadt zurückkehren, verliebt Faust sich in das unschuldig-reine Gretchen. Des Nachts steigt er in Gretchens Zimmer ein, um sie zu verführen, während Mephisto deren gerade aus dem Krieg heimgekehrten Bruder Valentin herausfordert und tötet. Zu allem Unglück entdeckt Gretchens Mutter Faust im Zimmer ihrer Tochter, worüber sie aus Gram stirbt.
Gretchen wird von ihrer Umwelt verstoßen. Als sie einsam und verlassen im Winter ein Kind zur Welt bringt und dieses in der Kälte stirbt, wird sie zum Tode auf dem Scheiterhaufen verurteilt. Faust erfährt von ihrem drohenden Schicksal, verflucht die ewige Jugend und macht sich auf den Weg, Gretchen um Verzeihung zu bitten. Er steigt zu ihr auf den lodernden Scheiterhaufen, und im Augenblick des Todes erkennt Gretchen in dem alten Mann ihren Geliebten, vereint gehen sie in den Tod. Mephisto glaubt sein Ziel erreicht zu haben. Doch Gabriel verwehrt dem Teufel diesen Triumph: Die reine, echte Liebe zwischen Faust und Gretchen hat Mephistos böses Vorhaben zunichte gemacht.
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Faust – A German Folktale (German: Faust – Eine deutsche Volkssage) is a 1926 silentfantasy film, produced by Ufa, directed by F. W. Murnau, starring Gösta Ekman as Faust, Emil Jannings as Mephisto, Camilla Horn as Gretchen/Marguerite, Frida Richard as her mother, Wilhelm Dieterle as her brother, and Yvette Guilbert as Marthe Schwerdtlein, her aunt. Murnau’s film draws on older traditions of the legendary tale of Faust as well as on Goethe’s classic 1808 version. Ufa wanted Ludwig Berger to direct Faust, as Murnau was engaged with Variety; Murnau pressured the producer and, backed by Jannings, eventually persuaded Erich Pommer to let him direct the film.
Faust was Murnau’s last German film, and directly afterward he moved to the United States under contract to William Fox to direct Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927); when the film premiered in the Ufa-Palast am Zoo in Berlin, Murnau was already shooting in Hollywood. Faust has been praised for its special effects and is regarded as an example of German expressionist film.
Plot
The demon Mephisto has a bet with an Archangel that he can corrupt a righteous man’s soul and destroy in him what is divine. If he succeeds, the Devil will win dominion over earth. The Devil delivers a plague to the village where Faust, an elderly alchemist, lives. Though he prays to stop the death and starvation, nothing happens. Disheartened, Faust throws his alchemy books in the fire, and then the Bible too. One book opens, showing how to have power and glory by making a pact with the Devil. He goes to a crossroads as described in the book’s procedure and conjures up the forces of evil. When Mephisto appears at the roadside, he induces Faust to make a trial, 24-hour bargain with the Devil. Faust will have Mephisto’s service till the sand runs out in an hourglass, at which time the Devil will rescind the pact. At first, Faust uses his new power to help the people of the village, but they shun him when they find out that he cannot face a cross. They stone him and he takes shelter in his home.
Faust then makes a further deal with Mephisto, who gives Faust back his youth and offers him earthly pleasures and a kingdom, in return for his immortal soul. Mephisto tempts Faust with the vision of a beautiful woman. He then takes him to a wedding feast in Parma, to meet the subject of his vision, an Italian Duchess. Faust departs with her, leaving the Devil to kill her groom. Just as Faust is making love to her the sands run out. He is obliged to seal the deal permanently in order to continue his love-making; he is Mephisto’s forever.
Faust soon grows weary of debauchery and yearns for “home“. Here Faust falls in love with an innocent girl, Gretchen, who is charmed into loving Faust by a golden chain left by the Devil. Faust comes to Gretchen’s room. The devil rouses the mother who sees them and drops dead from shock. The devil then incites her soldier brother, Valentin, to run home to catch her lover. Valentin and Faust fight a duel. The Devil intervenes and stabs Valentin in the back. He then goes around town shouting “murder”. Faust and Mephisto flee on the back of a hellish steed. Valentin condemns Faust for his murder and his sister as a harlot in his dying breath. She is put in the stocks and subjected to jeering. The girl has a child (by Faust) and ends up in the streets. In a blizzard she sees a vision of a warm cradle and lays her child down on the snow, where the child dies of exposure. Soldiers find her and she is sent to the stake as a murderess. Faust sees what is happening and demands Mephisto take him there. Faust arrives just as the fire has been started to burn his lover. Faust wishes he had never asked to have his youth back. Mephisto smashes