In London at the turn of the century, the bandit Mack the Knife marries Polly without the knowledge of her father, Peachum, the 'king of the beggars'.
Are you ready for the return of "This Is Us"? We are! See which other movies and TV shows we're excited about.
Related News
-
InDepth InterView: Maureen McGovern Discusses 54 Below Show, Home For The Holidays, Plus Broadway, Hollywood Memories & More
18 December 2012 | BroadwayWorld.com
"The Sinner" star talks us through his arc in the show's just-finished Season 2.
User Lists
Related lists from IMDb users
Share this Rating
Title: The 3 Penny Opera (1931)
Want to share IMDb's rating on your own site? Use the HTML below.
1 win.
See more awards »
Learn more
More Like This
Kameradschaft
(1931)
Drama
Director:
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Alexander Granach,
Fritz Kampers,
Ernst Busch
Three Penny Opera
(1963)
Drama
|
Musical
Director:
Wolfgang Staudte
Stars:
Curd Jürgens,
Hildegard Knef,
Gert Fröbe
Westfront 1918
(1930)
Drama
|
Romance
|
War
Director:
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Fritz Kampers,
Gustav Diessl,
Hans-Joachim Möbis
Diary of a Lost Girl
(1929)
Drama
Director:
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Louise Brooks,
Josef Rovenský,
Fritz Rasp
L'opéra de quat'sous
(1931)
Comedy
|
Crime
|
Musical
Director:
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Albert Préjean,
Florelle,
Gaston Modot
Le Million
(1931)
Musical
|
Comedy
Director:
René Clair
Stars:
Annabella,
René Lefèvre,
Jean-Louis Allibert
Secrets of a Soul
(1926)
Drama
Director:
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Werner Krauss,
Ruth Weyher,
Ilka Grüning
Pandora's Box
(1929)
Crime
|
Drama
|
Romance
Director:
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Louise Brooks,
Fritz Kortner,
Francis Lederer
White Hell of Pitz Palu
(1929)
Action
|
Adventure
|
Drama
Directors:
Arnold Fanck,
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Gustav Diessl,
Leni Riefenstahl,
Ernst Petersen
The Joyless Street
(1925)
Drama
Director:
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Asta Nielsen,
Greta Garbo,
Ágnes Eszterházy
Drama
Director:
Slatan Dudow
Stars:
Hertha Thiele,
Ernst Busch,
Martha Wolter
The Love of Jeanne Ney
(1927)
Drama
|
Romance
Director:
Georg Wilhelm Pabst
Stars:
Édith Jéhanne,
Uno Henning,
Fritz Rasp
Edit
Cast
| Complete credited cast: | |||
| Rudolf Forster | ... | Mackie Messer | |
 |
Carola Neher | ... | Polly |
| Reinhold Schünzel | ... | Tiger-Brown | |
| Fritz Rasp | ... | Peachum | |
| Valeska Gert | ... | Mrs. Peachum | |
| Lotte Lenya | ... | Jenny (as Lotte Lenja) | |
| Hermann Thimig | ... | The Vicar | |
| Ernst Busch | ... | The Street Singer | |
| Vladimir Sokoloff | ... | Smith, the Jailer (as Wladimir Sokolow) | |
| Paul Kemp | ... | Mackie Messer's Gang Member | |
|
|
Gustav Püttjer | ... | Mackie Messer's Gang Member |
|
|
Oskar Höcker | ... | Mackie Messer's Gang Member |
|
|
Krafft-Raschig | ... | Mackie Messer's Gang Member (as Kraft Raschig) |
|
|
Herbert Grünbaum | ... | Filch |
| Sylvia Torf | ... | Whorehouse owner | |
Edit
Plot Summary
|
Add Synopsis
Storyline
In London at the turn of the century, the bandit Mack the Knife marries Polly without the knowledge of her father, Peachum, the 'king of the beggars'. Written by Brian rawnsley <rawnsleb@natlib.govt.nz>
Parents Guide:
Add content advisory for parents »
Edit
See full technical specs »
Details
Country:
GermanyLanguage:
GermanRelease Date:
19 October 1956 (East Germany) See more »Also Known As:
Beggar's Opera See more »Filming Locations:
Halensee, Grunewald, Berlin, GermanyCompany Credits
Show more on
IMDbPro »
Technical Specs
Runtime:
| (censored) | (DVD)Sound Mix:
Mono (Tobis-Klangfilm)Color:
Black and WhiteAspect Ratio:
1.20 : 1
Edit
See more »
Did You Know?
Trivia
The film was banned by the Nazi Party in 1933 and prints of the film were destroyed. The film was restored and reconstructed in the 1960s. See more »Quotes
Peachum: You too wish to be part of this splendid occasion. You, poorest of the poor, who'd long ago have perished in the sewers of Turnbridge if I hadn't spent sleepless nights devising a way to wring a few pence out of your poverty. For I've shown that the rich of this world have no qualms about causing misery but can't bear the sight of it. They have hard hearts but weak nerves. Well, we won't spare their nerves today! By the thousands we'll tear at their nerves, for our rags do not conceal our ...See more »
I've just seen the restored 2006 German print, and while I found it entertaining, it's almost as long as the stage musical. The film medium can't support this, and after about the first half hour, it becomes claustrophobic and momentum-less, and a great disappointment. I had to fight the urge to pick up the clicker and press fast-forward. Part of the problem seems to me that the screenplay adapter or adapters didn't trust Brecht and Weill's theatrical instincts sufficiently: they left out half the songs (though the sound is remarkably good for 1931) and reordered the ones that were left. Most problematically, they rewrote the ending, with this nonsense of Polly and the gang taking over a bank. No march to the scaffold, no "Ballad of Sexual Dependency", no last-minute pardon from the King...
Many reviewers here seem to take the London location too seriously. That's just a relic of the John Gay original (The Beggar's Opera): it is most clearly meant to be a satire on Weimar Republic Germany. That's why the Nazis banned it. The real corruption is in the official institutions of power, not in the relatively benign underworld (which reappears in very similar shape and form in Fritz Lange's "M".) Those who don't know Brecht's translations of Gay's original names and texts should learn that MacHeath becomes 'Mackie Messer' (messer mean 'knife' in German, thus 'Mack the Knife'.)
The best thing about the film, is probably the documentary record it contains of just how the original audiences would have seen the story, and how the original performers would have rendered the songs. I particularly liked the Moritaet-Saenger and his incredible trilled "Rs" in the opening scene.