Das Lied ist Aus (The Song Is Ended) is a typical early-talkie German musical in every respect, save one. The story, concerning the lives and loves of show folk, ends unhappily -- and surprisingly so. The doleful denouement didn't seem to have much effect on the film's box-office appeal, since Das Lied ist Aus proved a major moneymaker.
Baruch Mayer, son of an orthodox rabbi from a poor shtetl in Galizia, decides to break with the family tradition and leave the shtetl to become an actor.
Ivan, a poor Russian student, lives in Switzerland. He is unexpectedly invited to Russia by a distant relative, Princess Wirsky. To finance the journey, he works as a messenger for revolutionaries who want to depose Grand Duke Wirsky. In Moscow, he delivers the message and falls in love with Marja, the daughter of the revolutionary, but Marja's father loves Princess Wirsky and wants to betray the revolutionaries. The princess falls in love with Ivan, and jealously deports Marja to Siberia. In revenge, Ivan strangles the princess. He spends the rest of his life yearning for Marja, whom he has never kissed. When he receives the news of Marja's death, he commits suicide.
One out of three silent adaptations of the novella "Les quatre diables" written by Danish author Herman Bang. The most famous one, although unfortunately lost, is without any doubt F.W. Murnau's "4 Devils". This German version, by Danish director A.W. Sandberg, was done eight years prior to Murnau's American one, and was a big success at the time.
The film was an unauthorized adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's novel The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, but the source material went unrecognized by some of the German media due to changes in the characters' names. Released in 1920, this is one of Murnau's lost films. While the film itself does not survive, the scripts and related production notes do. Because the film is lost, its full length is unknown. Dr. Warren is the Dr. Jekyll character who changes into Mr. O'Connor, a parallel of Mr. Hyde. This transformation is brought about, not by experimentation with chemicals as in Stevenson's original, but through the supernatural agency of a bust of Janus (the Roman god of the doorway), which Warren / O'Connor purchases in the opening sequence as a gift for his sweetheart, Jane. When she refuses the gift, horrified, Warren / O'Connor is forced to keep the statuette himself...
