Frau im Mond (1929)

Director:

Fritz Lang

Writers:

Fritz Lang (writer)
Hermann Oberth (technical material)

Release Date:

6 February 1931 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Sci-Fi

Plot:

A scientist discovers that there's gold on the moon, he builds a rocket to fly there, but there's too...

Plot Keywords:

Moon | Rocket | Gold | Dark Side Of The Moon | Count Down

Cast

Willy Fritsch	...	Wolf Helius
Gerda Maurus	...	Stud. astr. Friede Velten
Klaus Pohl	...	Professor Georg Manfeldt
Fritz Rasp	...	Der Mann, der sich derzeit Walt Turner nennt
Gustl Gstettenbaur	...	Gustav (as Gustl Stark-Gstettenbaur)
Gustav von Wangenheim	...	Ingenieur Hans Windegger
Tilla Durieux	...	Fünf Gehirne und Scheckbücher
Margarete Kupfer	...	Frau Hippolt, Haushälterin bei Helius
Alexa von Porembsky	...	Eine Veilchenverkäuferin
Gerhard Dammann	...	Der Werkmeister der Helius-Flugwerften (as Dammann)
Heinrich Gotho	...	Der Mieter vom II. Stock (as Gotho)
Alfred Loretto	...	Zwei eindeutige Existenzen (as Loretto)
Max Maximilian	...	Grotjan, Chauffeur bei Helius (as Maximilian)
Edgar Pauly	...	Zwei eindeutige Existenzen (as Pauly)
Karl Platen	...	Der Mann am Mikrophon

Also Known As:

By Rocket to the Moon (USA)
Girl in the Moon (UK)
Woman in the Moon (USA)

Runtime:

156 min | 200 min (2000 restoration) | Spain:104 min | Spain:162 min (DVD edition) | USA:95 min | West Germany:91 min (edited version) (1970)

Country:

Germany

Language:

German

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Silent

Certification:

Germany:(Banned) (1933-1945) | Spain:T | West Germany:6

Company:

Fritz Lang-Film

Trivia:

When the Nazis began working on war rockets, they decided the movie's rockets were too close to the truth. To preserve secrecy, they had the models destroyed and the film withdrawn from release.

Goofs:

Factual errors: Dr. Manfeldt's newspaper clipping contains the date "Donnerstag (Thursday) August 17, 1896". That day was actually a Monday.

Quotes:

[Opening intertitle]
The Author: "Never" does not exist for the human mind... only "Not yet."

Movie Connections:

Featured in "Disneyland: Man in Space (#1.20)" (1955)

Soundtrack:

Heimlich singt für uns die Liebe

Longer than an actual flight to the moon!

I saw the original premiere presentation director's cut of this movie in January of 2003, with excellent musical accompaniment by Dennis James at the Paramount theater. Perfect, restored print, a movie that I have always wanted to see (since it was mentioned in Carlos Clarens "Horror Movies" first published in 1967). HOWEVER... The tendency toward "original, premiere presntation" director's cut reached new heights of lunacy (pun intended) with this movie. It ran more than three hours and 40 minutes! According to it's IMDB entry the original version that ran in the US was 95 minutes with longer versions (running time up to 2 and a half hours) running in Europe. At times I felt as if I had been placed in hypersleep in prep for a deep space expedition of my own! The film certainly lived up to advance billing, yet certain things, like the 45-minute opening dinner scene, were obviously way longer than they needed to be. One doesn't need to be a genius to know that after the premiere, Fritz Lang probably cut the dinner scene to about three minutes, removed whole sections, and generally tightened up an otherwise improbable story. For example, the moon is portrayed as a rather pleasant (if poorly stocked with resources for survival) beach resort. Everyone runs around in sweaters and jodhpurs, and true love seems destined to survive the wait for a return rescue rocket. Other stuff was great: the launch pad, countdown and the experience of the G forces on blastoff were, well the archetypal events for all the space operas to follow. A good movie, but probably seen to much better effect on video or in the shorter release version (if either ever turns up).