Die Pest in Florenz

Die Pest in Florenz (aka The Plague in Florence) (1919) is an early adaptation of Edgar Alan Poe's Masque of the Red Death made all the more intriguing by a script from Fritz Lang that foreshadows many of his later, more famous motifs. Telling the tale of a rich temptress who enters Florence and immediately starts corrupting its piety and peasants, she casts her bewitching spell of lust and revelry on the leaders of the city, not to mention the local hermit monk. After the church leaves town the place literally goes to hell (where Lang gets his first crack at a dragon), ultimately becoming the target of a vengeful black death to settle the score for the papists back in the Vatican.

More D.W.Griffith that Robert Wiene, it's clear that director Otto Rippert (of Homunculus fame) is no Lang but there are some elements that keep one entertained. Visually, there is some shot 'matting' that is quite well developed and adds interest but, for me, the most fun was had seeing all the elemental story prototypes that Lang would develop more fully in his own Niebelungen films or Metropolis, particularly the lone woman coming in and destroying the well-ordered society by driving the men nuts. The Murnau restoration is first rate and, while it might not be everybody's cup of mead, I thoroughly enjoyed the modernist score by Uwe Dierksen.