The Last Laugh [Der letzte Mann] ***** (1924, Emil Jannings, Maly Delschaft, Max Hiller) – Classic Movie Review 2474

Director F W Murnau’s tear-jerking 1924 tragic drama The Last Laugh [Der letzte Mann] provides a marvellous showcase for the great silent movie actor Emil Jannings.

He gives a superb display of silent film acting in this tragically sad, profoundly affecting story of a proud doorman at a famous Berlin hotel who is demoted to looking after the men’s room as a washroom attendant, as he is considered too old and infirm to represent the image of the hotel. He is all washed up. Jannings tries to hide his demotion from his friends, family and neighbours but, to his shame, he is discovered and forced to face the scorn of society.

Filmed with utmost brio and, unusually, without a single inter-title caption representing spoken dialogue to interrupt the visuals, Murnau’s great German film is a classic example of pure cinema. The screenplay is written by Carl Mayer, and both men were to re-unite in America on Sunrise (1927).

[Spoiler alert] The film’s only title card says: ‘Here the story should really end, for, in real life, the forlorn old man would have little to look forward to but death. The author took pity on him and has provided a quite improbable epilogue.’ The ending inspires the English language title, but the German original Der letzte Mann translates as The Last Man.

Murnau said: ‘All our efforts must be directed towards abstracting everything that isn’t the true domain of the cinema. Everything that is trivial and acquired from other sources, all the tricks, devices and clichés inherited from the stage and from book.’ That is, pure cinema. The film was shot entirely at the UFA Studios, enabling cinematographer Karl Freund to use the much-praised elaborate artistic camera movements and surrealist images.

But it was Murnau who had the last laugh when he said that the story was absurd as ‘everyone knows that a washroom attendant makes more than a doorman’.

The Last Laugh [Der letzte Mann] was cut to 77 minutes but now runs 91 minutes (DVD edition) but the original German running time was 101 minutes.

Also in the cast are Max Hiller, Maly Delschaft, Hans Unterkircher, Emilie Kurz, Olaf Storm, Hermann Vallentin, Georg John and Emmy Wyda.

The Last Laugh [Der Letzte Mann] is directed by F W Murnau, runs 77 or 91 minutes, is made by UFA, is written by Carl Mayer, is shot in black and white by Karl Freund, is produced by Erich Pommer, and is scored by Edgar G Ulmer.

In 1955 the film was remade starring Hans Albers.

In 1929 Jannings won the first Best Actor Oscar for The Way of All Flesh and Josef von Sternberg’s The Last Command. But, after the rise of Hitler, Jannings continued his career in the service of Nazism and cinema. During the Third Reich, he starred in several films that were intended to promote Nazism. In 1936 Nazi Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels named him an Artist of the State (Staatsschauspieler).

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 2474

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