Fritz Lang

Friedrich Anton Christian Lang (December 5, 1890 - August 2, 1976) was an Austrian film director, screenwriter and occasional film producer, one of the best known emigrés from Germany's school of expressionism to work in Hollywood. His most famous films are probably the groundbreaking Metropolis (the world's most expensive silent film at the time of its release) and M, made before he moved to the United States.

Early life and career

Born in Vienna, Lang grew up the son of an architect. Both his father and his mother were practising Catholics, as was Lang himself; indeed he was baptized in the Schottenkirche near his family's home. However, his mother, Paula Schlesinger Lang was born Jewish and was a convert to Catholicism. Lang took up civil engineering at the Technical University of Vienna but was not enthusiastic about it and switched studies to art in 1908. In 1910 and 1911 he left Vienna to see the world, traveling to Africa and later Asia and the Pacific area. At the outbreak of the First World War he was drafted into service in the Austrian-Hungarian army and fought in World War I, where he was wounded several times. After recovering from injuries and shell shock he was discharged as lieutenant from the army.

Related Topics:
Vienna - Catholics - Schottenkirche - Jewish - Catholicism - Technical University of Vienna - 1908 - 1910 - 1911 - First World War - World War I - Shell shock - Lieutenant

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After the war he joined Germany's Ufa studio just as the Expressionist movement was waxing. In this first phase of his career, Lang alternated between art films such as Der Müde Tod (the silent death) and populist thrillers such as Die Spinnen (the spiders) (a two-part film), combining popular genres with Expressionist techniques to create an unprecedented synthesis of popular entertainment with art cinema, culminating in his most famous silent works: Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler (1922), a crime epic (running four hours in two parts in its original version, recently restored by the Munich Filmmuseum) focusing on the psychological conflict between the master criminal Mabuse and detective Von Wenk; Die Nibelungen (1924), and his most famous film, Metropolis (1927).

Related Topics:
Ufa - Expressionist - 1922 - Munich - Mabuse - 1924 - Metropolis - 1927

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