1931
M is a 1931 German silent film with Peter Lorre. It is directed by Fritz Lang, known for his German films Metropolis, Siegfreid, Kriemhild's Rache (Kriemhild's Revenge) which he made before coming to the U.S. where he made such films as Fury, Scarlet Street, Hangmen Also Die and so on. Time is running out. A serial child murderer is loose in Berlin. The police are under pressure from the community and from the politicians The politicians themselves are under pressure from the people. The crooks are upset because the manhunt by the police for the killer is ruining their business.
Ultimately the underworld figures set out to find the killer themselves. The police and the underworld people pursue the killer in their own way and ultimately both do arrive at the place where they can make the arrest. The underworld finds him first, but they police who have located his apartment are close behind and ultimately secire him from the hands of the mob.
The idea of time manifests itself in many ways in the film. From the opening sound of the gong which marked the top of the hour and the news that it brought, to the circles of people which occur throughout the film. The circle of children which opens the film, has a young girl in the center, her hand outstretched like the hand of a clock, turns pointing at each child until one is child is selected and removed from the circle the way the murderer is selected children at random and “removing” them while she sings a rather gruesome rhyme about a killer coming to get the children.
Later a group of men sitting around a table again resemble a clock and again one is removed from the circle in an accusation of murder. Near the films climax, Fritz, who has cut his way through the ceiling into an office below climbs a rope to find himself encircled by police and are single individuals as in the other two situations, led away.
Lang’s use of sound in this, his first sound film, is as creative as the film techniques he pioneered in his silent film days. Sound does not simply act realistically, but rather takes on a life of its own making points creatively. In keeping with his circular images, there are numerous depictions of time through images and sound. A cuckoo clock is heard before it is seen; a thief plays with several watches on the table and calls the time to get the “correct time”; the night watchmen check time clocks and it is the crook who is sent to “punch in” locates the murderer when he hears rather than sees him. The afore mentioned gong which opens the film to the innumerable whistles that occur during the film, sound plays a role in the film. Its relation with the images is complex.
There is talk about time as well. As the hysteria grows, a young girl approaches a man on the street to ask the time of day. The crook gets the time from the phone and repeats it, as they worry about the crooks worry about their leader coming late.
The killer is identified by a whistled version of Edvard Grieg’s “The Hall of the Mountain King” from Peer Gynt. We hear the whistling before we see the killer’s face.
The deserted spaces and empty table we see with no ambient sounds is matched by the emptiness of the spaces. Similarly the empty spaces in the Crocodile Club showing the loot collected are also silent.
Again, the empty building is seen with only a voice over after everyone has fled the office building.
Lang’s feeling that when one’s attention is focused on one sensory input the others fade away. His example is of overhearing a conversation in restaurant and then getting the menu and suddenly focusing on that until the conversation disappears. This is followed through in the film and is a kind of expressionistic use of sound in which the sound design reflects an internal state of mind.
Sound also enlarges the screen. Off screen sounds remind the viewer that there is more than is on the screen. Off screen seems more dangerous. The bus that approached the child is from off screen. The whistling of the killer is off screen as well.
There is a repeated motif of an arm entering the frame – the blind man’s arm touches Beckert’s shoulder when he identifies him, the defense lawyer (who claims to have a hopeless case) reaches in to Beckert from outside the frame, as does the “long arm of the law” when the police seize the killer.
Although the overt message of the film is, at least textually, that people need to watch the children. There is a feeling that as society has become more complex there needs to be some control is needed. Society is complex and integrated and the different parts have become specialized and impact on one another.
There is a great deal of doubling in the film. Various techniques link carious characters:
The hunched shadow of Beckart as he approaches the first victim we see is matched in the next shot by the mother of the girl about to be murdered as the mother bends over a wash basin.
The “creator” of the girl is thus linked with the murderer. The one who gave life is linked to the one who takes it.
Both Inspector Lohmann and the killer Beckert are introduced through their shadows and both whistle during the film.
Meetings between the members of the underworld and matched by and intercut with those of the police to such an extent that when the head of the underworld makes a statement with an accompanying gesture, the head of the police finishes both the line and the gesture, thus linking the police and the underworld – both of whom are linked by their simultaneous pursuit of the killer.
By the end of the film, one of the underworld characters is masquerading as a police officer and is costumed in a police uniform.
The idea of the “double” (the German word is Doppelgänger) a kind of Jekyll and Hide idea is present
The films insistence on responsibility is overt in that the main argument made during the underworld’s “trial” of Beckert revolves a good deal on the nature of whether someone driven by a compulsion is more or less guilty than one who simply commits acts voluntarily. In either case tragedy may result. Do the mothers of the murdered girls really care about the reasons the killer acted? We are denied a legal judgment at the end of the film and instead we are only told that we are all to be watchful of the children.
The film is full of film noir images. Film noir was an outgrowth of directors fleeing Germany as the Nazis began to become more powerful. These directors were in the expressionist mode (see Das Kabinett des Dr. Caligari – The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari) Most films did not reach the extremes produced in Caligari. Film noir deals thematically largely with the city as a dangerous place, a world full of shadows and the idea that people are trapped in situations mot necessarily of their own creation although there is a feeling that some character flaw draws them in. Visually noir films exhibit chiaroscuro lighting (pools of light surrounded by darkness) and images of entrapment – bars, shadows, and other objects obscuring the faces of the characters. There are images of duplicity (often reflections in mirrors) showing 2 sides to a given character. This is very close to the idea of the Doppelgänger discussed earlier.
The scenes of the wet city streets at night with its pools of light from street lights and car lights are fore runners of the 40’s noir films. As the underworld and the police move in the killer appears framed by 2 pineapples, and then through a thick bush around the table where he drinks cognac, and later dramatically when trapped in the attic of the office building.
There are a number of indications of nervousness and tension among police and underworld characters. Incessant smoking which obscures the view and also links the two groups.
The film deals with mass media and its impact on life. A magazine about killings is delivered to Elsie’s mother as her daughter is being murdered. Newspapers are important. People cry “extra” as crowds gather to hear the latest horrors, Beckery wants his letter published in the paper, one of the men at the table reads aloud from the paper, “reward notices” are posted along with other forms of entertainment and the telegraph wires against which the balloon is stuck, are all references to mass communication and to this degree the film is slightly reflexive. A mass media film about killings is like the papers, the magazine and the posters advertising the reward and other forms of entertainment.
The films shows the impact of these on human behavior as the hysteria begins to grow. First one man accuse the other at the table, then the man of whom the girl asks the time is thought to be the murderer, and then the pickpocket who is being from the bus is accused as well. Groups turn into mobs.
The relationship between the bad guy/good guy in crime stories (and Westerns) can als be seen in war films where what would be normally illegal activities (like killing) become acceptable and often valorized. The conflict between having to (must) kill with “don’t want to” mirrors the conflict in Beckert. While there are certainly messages about people taking responsibility for their actions and whether their can be a “uncontrollable force or drive” (sometimes called “irresistible impulse) (see Anatomy of a Murder), the question can be raised to the level of warfare. While crime and warfare are not seen here as the same thing, they are certainly held to have some similarities. There were many people suffering from “shell schock” (post traumatic stress disorder) which may result from internal conflicts. Hence the deaths and injuries both physical and mental states among young people can be equated with dangers to children from serial killers. (similar but not congruent situations).
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