Home | Movies By Year | Movies from 1926
Tartuffe (1926 film)
Buy Tartuffe (1926 film) now from AmazonFirst, read the Wikipedia article. Then, scroll down to see what other TopShelfReviews readers thought about the movie. And once you've experienced the movie, tell everyone what you thought about it.
Wikipedia article
'Tartuffe' ('Herr Tartff') is a German silent film produced by Erich Pommer for UFA and released in 1926. It was directed by F. W. Murnau, photographed by Karl Freund and written by Carl Mayer from Molire's original play. It was shot at the Tempelhof Studios in Berlin. Set design and costumes were by Robert Herlth and Walter Rhrig.
The film starred Emil Jannings as Tartuffe, Lil Dagover as Elmire and Werner Krauss as Orgon.
Based on the play 'Tartuffe', the film retains the basic plot, but Murnau and Mayer pared down Molire's play, eliminating most of the secondary characters and concentrating on the triangle of Orgon, Elmire and Tartuffe. They also introduced a framing device, whereby the story of Tartuffe becomes a film-within-a-film, shown by a young actor as a device to warn his grandfather about his unctuous but evil housekeeper.
Cast
Restoration and home video
Like all Murnau's surviving films, 'Tartuffe' is licensed by the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation, whose tinted restoration is distributed on home video with a piano score by Javier Prez de Azpeitia. It has been released on DVD in the US (Kino Lorber) and in identical editions in the UK (Eureka/Masters of Cinema), France (mk2), Germany (Universum Film) and Spain (Divisa). The FWMS restoration has also been released on Blu-ray in the UK by Eureka/MoC.
In 2015, a new, longer and more accurate restoration with a full orchestral score was broadcast on Arte television, and as of April 2020 it is available on home video only in the U.S. via Kino Lorbers Blu-ray reissue.
Legacy
In retrospective reviews, critics commented on the film's mise-en-scene and praised the performances. Several critics noted the rarity of a comedy directed by Murnau, who was famous for the expressionist dramas.[https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/tartuffe_1925/reviews?type=top_critics "Tartuffe - Movie ...."] 'Rotten Tomatoes'. 4 August 2021. Its humorous storyline and happy ending has rendered it a minor work in Murnau's filmography and has led film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum to call it "underrated."Rosenbaum, Jonathan. [https://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/tartuffe/Film?oid=1073350 "Tartuffe."] 'Chicago Reader'. 4 August 2021.Smith, Derek. [https://www.slantmagazine.com/dvd/review-f-w-murnau-adaption-moliere-tartuffe-on-kino-blu-ray/ "Review: F.W. Murnaus Adaption of Molires Tartuffe on Kino Blu-ray."] 'Slant Magazine'. 29 April 2020. 4 August 2021.
See also
*1926 in film
*List of comedy films of the 1920s
*List of drama films of the 1920s
*List of UFA films
References
Buy Tartuffe (1926 film) now from Amazon
<-- Return to movies from 1926