Thea von Harbou

Thea von Harbou

Birth : 1888-12-19, Tauperlitz, Germany

Death : 1954-07-01

History

Thea Gabriele von Harbou was a German actress and author of Prussian aristocratic origin. She was born in Tauperlitz in the Kingdom of Bavaria. She is especially known for the 1927 science fiction film Metropolis directed by her husband Fritz Lang. She would often publish her screenplays as novels. In 1933, Lang fleed Nazi Germany as he was Jewish; whilst she made several Nazi propaganda films. She later married Ayi Tendulkar, a journalist of Indian origin - before dying in 1954.

Profile

Thea von Harbou

Movies

Giorgio Moroder's Metropolis
Novel
In 1984, Academy Award winning composer Giorgio Moroder introduced Fritz Lang’s science fiction epic Metropolis to a new generation of filmgoers. Working in collaboration with film archivists globally, Moroder supervised a special reconstruction, with color tinting, fewer intertitles and newly restored footage. A pioneer in the field of digital music, Moroder backed this special edition with a throbbing new score, punctuated with pop songs from some of the biggest stars of the early MTV era: Freddie Mercury, Pat Benatar, Adam Ant, Bonnie Tyler, Loverboy and others.
Journey to the Lost City
Screenplay
An exotic dancing girl of India inflames the passions of a traveling draftsman.
Journey to the Lost City
Novel
An exotic dancing girl of India inflames the passions of a traveling draftsman.
The Indian Tomb
Novel
Seetha and Harold Berger are rescued from the desert by a caravan and brought to a small village. However, the greedy owner of the house where they are lodged betrays the law of hospitality and reveals their location to Prince Ramigani. The couple tries to escape but is hunted and captured by Ramigani and his men. Meanwhile Irene Rhode and her husband Walter Rhode suspect that Maharaja Chandra is not telling the truth about Harold's destiny. The conspirator Ramigani forces Seetha to accept to get married with Chandra to provoke the wrath of the priests and get the alliance of Prince Padhu and his army. In the meantime, Harold succeeds in escaping from the dungeon and seeks out Seetha to save her.
The Tiger of Eschnapur
Novel
In Eschnapur, a German architect saves the life of the Maharajah's favorite temple dancer and becomes Maharajah's friend but their friendship is tested when the architect and the dancer fall in-love, triggering the Maharajah's vengeful ire.
Fahrt ins Glück
Writer
Via Mala
Screenplay
In a mountain village a deranged alcoholic who routinely beats his wife and kids goes missing. Though everyone in the village is glad to see him gone, an investigation begins. Made at the end of the Nazi era and immediately shelved; not released until 1948.
Annelie
Screenplay
On New Year′s Eve 1871 Annelie is born – 15 minutes too late, since her parents had calculated her birth to be exactly at midnight. These 15 minutes will again and again become the girl′s fate.
Wie konntest Du, Veronika!
Writer
Hurra, ich bin Papa
Writer
Menschen vom Varieté
Writer
In a cosmopolitan city vaudeville theatre, meeting place of the most successful artistes, the art shooter gets in suspicion to have committed a murderous poster on his jealous partner. - Not particularly successful mixture of vaudeville theatre numbers, artiste's destiny and crime film tension, on an average produced and played. A production rotated in Budapest with the popular dancer La Jana.
The Stars of Variety Show
Screenplay
Theatre Colosseum prepares for the closing performance of the month. The magician Keats wants to avoid having to perform with Jack Carey, the well-known marksman, as the latter has seduced his wife, the beautiful dancer, Silvia Castellani. It is only thanks to the persuasions of Alice McLean, the manager of the acrobat sisters, that he finally decides to do his show. Carey starts wooing the second of the McLean-sisters, Gloria.
Die Frau am Scheidewege
Screenplay
Following the breakdown of her marriage to an artist, a female doctor goes back to her position at a hospital.
Covered Tracks
Screenplay
Séraphine and her mother arrive in Paris to visit the 1867 World Exhibition. In an overcrowded city they must be accommodated in separate hotels. During the night the mother, who wasn't feeling very well, gets suddenly worse. When next morning Séraphine goes to meet her every trace of her presence has disappeared and everybody denies having ever met her. The bewildered young woman must find someone who believes her. Previous version of So Long at the Fair (1950).
Jugend
Writer
Germany, 1890: Having just gotten his high-school diploma, Hans leaves for Heidelberg to begin his university studies. But first, he wants to visit his uncle, Pastor Hoppe, in the small village of Rosenau. It's here that he again meets his cousin and childhood friend Annie. Annie is the illegitimate child of Pastor Hoppe's sister, who's left the upbringing of her offspring to the man-of-the-cloth. Conservative chaplain Schigorski continually tries to convince Annie to join the nearby cloister and thus "atone" for the sins of her mother. And it's getting more difficult for the fun-loving girl to escape the chaplain's harrassment. When Hans arrives, old feelings of lust come back to the surface.
Le Tigre du Bengale
Novel
The Indian Tomb
Novel
After the events of Der Tiger von Eschnapur, Maharadscha Chandra is ready to execute his well-planned vengeance, in which German architect Peter Fürbringer, his fiancée Irene and his assistant will have to fight for their lives amidst a revolt fueled by traitor Prinz Ramigani.
The Tiger of Eschnapur
Novel
Mother Song
Screenplay
A romance between two temperamental singing stars. Highlights include a lengthy selection from Faust, with Gigli making a most impressive Mephistopheles. The plot takes a melodramatic turn towards the climax, with the lives of the characters mirrored in their on-stage behavior. Director Carmine Gallone was something of an expert in the field of filmed opera, as witness his Tosca, Rigoletto and Il Trovatore.
Mother Song
Story
A romance between two temperamental singing stars. Highlights include a lengthy selection from Faust, with Gigli making a most impressive Mephistopheles. The plot takes a melodramatic turn towards the climax, with the lives of the characters mirrored in their on-stage behavior. Director Carmine Gallone was something of an expert in the field of filmed opera, as witness his Tosca, Rigoletto and Il Trovatore.
The Broken Jug
Screenplay
The man who broke the jug, the judge, is trying a case who determine who broke the jug. Long before the evidence becomes conclusive against the suspects, it becomes apparent that the blustering and bullying - and naive - village judge is the guilty one.
Versprich mir nichts!
Writer
Maler Pratt, an artist, refuses to sell his paintings as he thinks that they still need improvement before being publicly exhibited, but his wife Monika thinks differently and sells them because she thinks they are good...and they need the money. As he only signs an "M" on his work, Monika has no difficulty in claiming she is "M", but problems arrive when she is commissioned to do a large mural and Maler refuses to help her out. However, his creative spirit gets the best of him and he does the mural which is widely acclaimed to be a great work of art. Felder , an art dealer, is not overly pleased with this turn of events as he has been pleading with Monika to divorce her shiftless husband and marry him.
The Sovereign
Screenplay
Der Herrscher (The Sovereign) was based on Before Sunset, a play by Gerhart Hauptmann. The great Emil Jannings stars as Mathias Clausen, a self-made businessman who is forced to do a great deal of soul-searching when his wife unexpectedly dies. Determining to start life anew, he falls in love with his secretary Inken (Marianne Hoppe) and impulsively takes a vacation to Italy. Clausen's selfish grown children, not wishing to share their father's affections -- nor his money -- with his new wife-to-be, go to court demanding that Clausen be declared mentally incompetent. Upon finding this out, Clausen flies into a rage, leaving the audience to wonder whether or not he really as gone off his trolley. Der Herrscher was directed by Veit Harlan, more famous (or notorious) for his viciously anti-Semitic Jud Suess (1940).
I Was Jack Mortimer
Writer
The jealous star conductor Montemayor knows that his beautiful younger wife, Winifred, is cheating on him with an American named Jack Mortimer. After the concert rehearsal, he takes a taxi to the train station, sees Mortimer and shoots him at an intersection from the backseat of his taxi. The shot is not heard during the traffic noise. The taxi driver, Sponer, sitting in his car with the now-dead Mortimer, goes into a panic.
An Ideal Husband
Writer
Sir Robert Chiltern is a successful Government minister, well-off and with a loving wife. All this is threatened when Mrs Cheveley appears in London with damning evidence of a past misdeed. Sir Robert turns for help to his friend Lord Goring, an apparently idle philanderer and the despair of his father. Goring knows the lady of old, and, for him, takes the whole thing pretty seriously.
Turandot, princesse de Chine
Writer
Der alte und der junge König
Writer
The story of the stormy relationship between King Friedrich Wilhelm and his son, who later became known as King Frederick the Great of Prussia.
Prinzessin Turandot
Screenplay
Was bin ich ohne Dich
Writer
Hanneles Himmelfahrt
Writer
Hanneles Himmelfahrt
Director
Elisabeth und der Narr
Writer
Elisabeth und der Narr
Director
The Testament of Dr. Mabuse
Screenplay
After a detective is assaulted by thugs and placed in an asylum run by Professor Baum, he observes the professor's preoccupation with another patient, the criminal genius Dr. Mabuse the hypnotist. When Mabuse's notes are found to be connected with a rash of recent crimes, Commissioner Lohmann must determine how Mabuse is communicating with the criminals, despite conflicting reports on the doctor's whereabouts, and capture him for good.
The child's first right
Screenplay
M
Screenplay
In this classic German thriller, Hans Beckert, a serial killer who preys on children, becomes the focus of a massive Berlin police manhunt. Beckert's heinous crimes are so repellant and disruptive to city life that he is even targeted by others in the seedy underworld network. With both cops and criminals in pursuit, the murderer soon realizes that people are on his trail, sending him into a tense, panicked attempt to escape justice.
Woman in the Moon
Author
A scientist discovers that there's gold on the moon. He builds a rocket to fly there, but there's too much rivalry among the crew to have a successful expedition.
Spies
Screenplay
The mastermind behind a ubiquitous spy operation learns of a dangerous romance between a Russian lady in his employ and a dashing agent from the government's secret service.
Spies
Novel
The mastermind behind a ubiquitous spy operation learns of a dangerous romance between a Russian lady in his employ and a dashing agent from the government's secret service.
Metropolis
Novel
In a futuristic city sharply divided between the rich and the poor, the son of the city's mastermind meets a prophet who predicts the coming of a savior to mediate their differences.
Metropolis
Screenplay
In a futuristic city sharply divided between the rich and the poor, the son of the city's mastermind meets a prophet who predicts the coming of a savior to mediate their differences.
The Chronicles of the Gray House
Writer
Hinrich, the son of a feudal German landowner, falls in love with the beautiful daughter of one of his father's serfs despite opposition from both families. But when he actually offers marriage to her, this is going too far. The return of his brother Detlev, with an unscrupulous aristocratic bride of his own and a rival claim to their father's estates, proves to be the trigger for tragedy.
Michael
Screenplay
A famed artist fights his passion for a male model, until the young man falls for a woman.
Michael
Adaptation
A famed artist fights his passion for a male model, until the young man falls for a woman.
Die Nibelungen: Kriemhild's Revenge
Screenplay
When Kriemhild, thirsty for revenge, marries to Etzel, king of the Huns, she invites King Gunther and his court to visit them, intending to finally take the life of the man responsible of her disgrace.
Die Nibelungen: Siegfried
Screenplay
Siegfried, son of King Siegmund of Xanten, travels to Worms, capital of the Burgundian kingdom, to ask King Gunther for the hand of his sister, the beautiful Kriemhild.
The Finances of the Grand Duke
Writer
The likeable and carefree Grand Duke of Abacco is in dire straits. There is no money left to service the State's debt; the main creditor is looking forward to expropriating the entire Duchy. The marriage with Olga, Grand Duchess of Russia, would solve everything, but a crucial letter of hers about the engagement has been stolen. Besides, a bunch of revolutionaries and a dubious businessman have other plans regarding the Grand Duke. With the intrusion of adventurer Philipp Collins into the Grand Duke's affairs, a series of frantic chases, plots and counter-plots begins.
Driven from Home
Writer
A lost Murnau peasant-farm film.
Die Prinzessin Suwarin
Screenplay
The Stone Rider
Idea
In a distant Teutonic village, people dance and drink merrily celebrating a wedding feast. However, an elderly man tells the villagers that the valley where they live wasn't always happy but sorrowful. This was due to the tyranny of the master of the mountains who ruled the valley despotically.
Phantom
Writer
Lorenz Lubota is a city clerk with no direction in life. One day on his way to work he is run over by a woman driving a chariot and he is immediately infatuated with her.
Phantom
Adaptation
Lorenz Lubota is a city clerk with no direction in life. One day on his way to work he is run over by a woman driving a chariot and he is immediately infatuated with her.
Dr. Mabuse the Gambler: Inferno: A Game for the People of Our Age
Screenplay
As the police intensify their bemusing search on Doctor Mabuse's notorious band of gangsters, the deceptive, elusive hypnotist Mabuse simultaneously begins to close in on himself.
Dr. Mabuse the Gambler: The Great Gambler: A Picture of the Time
Screenplay
Doctor Mabuse is a criminal mastermind, doctor of psychology, and master of disguise, armed with the powers of hypnosis and mind control, who oversees the counterfeiting and gambling rackets of the Berlin underworld. He visits gambling dens by night under various guises and aliases, using the power of suggestion to win at cards and finance his plans.
Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler
Screenplay
Dr. Mabuse and his organization of criminals are in the process of completing their latest scheme, a theft of information that will allow Mabuse to make huge profits on the stock exchange. Afterwards, Mabuse disguises himself and attends the Folies Bergères show, where Cara Carozza, the main attraction of the show, passes him information on Mabuse's next intended victim, the young millionaire Edgar Hull. Mabuse then uses psychic manipulation to lure Hull into a card game where he loses heavily. When Police Commissioner von Wenk begins an investigation of this mysterious crime spree, he has little to go on, and he needs to find someone who can help him.
The Burning Soil
Writer
The film follows tells the story of a struggle over a plot of petroleum-rich land.
The Indian Tomb, Part II: The Tiger of Bengal
Writer
Rowland falls sick with leprosy while Mac Allan is captured by the Maharajah, who offers Irene a deal: one night with him in exchange for letting Rowland to be cured. She accepts, but tries to commit suicide.
The Indian Tomb, Part II: The Tiger of Bengal
Novel
Rowland falls sick with leprosy while Mac Allan is captured by the Maharajah, who offers Irene a deal: one night with him in exchange for letting Rowland to be cured. She accepts, but tries to commit suicide.
The Indian Tomb, Part I: The Mission of the Yogi
Novel
Ayan, Maharajah of Eschnapur, believes that his wife, Princess Savitri, has been unfaithful to him with officer Mac Allan. He decides to bury her alive, so he sends the Yogi Ramigani to England to look for Herbert Rowland, an architect; but when he orders him to build a tomb, Rowland refuses.
The Indian Tomb, Part I: The Mission of the Yogi
Writer
Ayan, Maharajah of Eschnapur, believes that his wife, Princess Savitri, has been unfaithful to him with officer Mac Allan. He decides to bury her alive, so he sends the Yogi Ramigani to England to look for Herbert Rowland, an architect; but when he orders him to build a tomb, Rowland refuses.
Destiny
Writer
As a young couple stops and rests in a small village inn, the man is abducted by Death and is sequestered behind a huge doorless, windowless wall. The woman finds a mystic entrance and is met by Death, who tells her three separate stories set in exotic locales, all involving circumstances similar to hers.
Der Leidensweg der Inge Krafft
Story
Four Around the Woman
Screenplay
Harry Yquem buys his beloved wife some jewelry in a place where underworld middlemen trade in fake and stolen goods. By chance, he spots a man with whom his wife had an affair in the past.
Die Frauen vom Gnadenstein
Screenplay
The Wandering Image
Writer
A woman (Mia May) takes a train to escape from her lover, who is also the father of her daughter, but he has sent her a telegram ensuring that she will never get rid of him. Thus begins a chase that leads into the mountains. There she meets a monk who willgive her all the support she needs. Drama about repentance, guilt and the possibility to achieve redemption through sacrifice.
Die Legende von der heiligen Simplicia
Writer
Simplicia has a reputation for healing through prayer and laying on of hands. Knight Rochus sets out "to see how long it takes to turn a saint into a sinner!" He sneaks into the monastery and forces Simplicia under his will.