Dr Mabuse: The Gambler (Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler) (Directors Suite) (1922)

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General		Extras
Category	Thriller	Featurette-The Music of Mabuse Featurette-Norbert Jacques, the literary inventor of Dr Mabuse Featurette-Mabuse's Motives Audio Commentary Trailer-Madman Trailers
Rating
Year Of Production	1922
Running Time	270:32 (Case: 332)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (43:20)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Fritz Lang
Studio Distributor	Transit Films Madman Entertainment	Starring	Rudolf Klein-Rogge Aud Egede Nissen Gertrude Welcker Alfred Abel Bernhard Goetzke Paul Richter Robert Forster-Larrinaga Hans Adalbert Schlettow Georg John Charles Puffy Grete Berger Julius Falkenstein Lydia Potechina
Case	Slip Case
RPI	?	Music	Konrad Elfers Robert Israel Aljoscha Zimmermann

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	Full Frame	Isolated Music Score Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) Isolated Music Score Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.29:1
16x9 Enhancement	No
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.29:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Dr. Mabuse is a sinister chap who fills his days exploiting the decadent Weimar Republic-era German aristocracy to further his own ends and make a tidy profit. Mabuse is a master of disguise and a hypnotist, frequently combining the two in his elaborate schemes. Aided by several minions, Mabuse's latest hobby is hypnotising aristocrats and cleaning them out at underground gambling clubs. After a series of successful fleecings, Investigator Wenk begins to track Mabuse down and finds himself in a dangerous game of cat and mouse with the sinister criminal.

    Though he is probably best known for the masterpieces M and Metropolis, the only character that director Fritz Lang repeatedly returned to throughout his illustrious career was that of Dr. Mabuse and it was with good reason. Mabuse is a character of great depth, cunning and resolve. These traits make him both a fascinating character to watch in the Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler saga as well as a survivor who can evolve to meet vastly different circumstances. The general nature of Mabuse's character becomes clear very quickly in The Great Gambler, but the intricacies and complexity of the character unfurl steadily throughout the course of this epic saga. Con, after backstab, after con, Mabuse is never short on surprises and this remains true throughout the various sequels that Lang released many years later.

    Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler is thoroughly damning of society in depression era Germany, particularly the upper classes. Mabuse plays every level of society with his hypnotic manipulation, working them against each other to further his ends. What makes it interesting in this regard is the thorough exploration of the class war. The film doesn't offer answers to the morally bankrupt aristocratic society's oppression of the underclass, but eludes the brewing storm amidst the population (a storm that would ultimately collapse the establishment and bring the rise of the Nazi Party). Each of the writers involved in the screen story (original novelist Norbert Jacques, along with screenwriters Fritz Lang and his wife Thea von Harbou) had differing political ideals and this gives the film a true breadth of perspective.

    Few will argue that this is not a landmark film, but Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler is certainly not a film for everyone. Many of the films' twists and turns are rather silly and the narrative is frequently confusing (although you can generally understand the gist of what is going on if not exactly why things are happening). The shonky English subtitles on this release don't help matters either (many of the translations are both overly literal and worded illogically, bordering on Engrish). Even if they don't know exactly what is going on, film and history buffs will revel in Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler - though even they will find it a heavy slog. At least the film's striking visuals will impress most viewers.

    The entire piece runs at about four and a half hours and it certainly feels it, despite being quite involving. The separation into two parts is very effective however. Each part comes to a natural conclusion and the film can comfortably be watched with room for a break in-between parts. I would personally recommend taking a few days between watching the two halves as The Inferno benefits from reflection upon The Great Gambler, much like a novel split into distinct parts.

Video

    The video looks very good considering the age of the film and the fact that this cut has been assembled from several different archival prints. There are occasional missing frames and the degree of film artefacts varies, but the sharpness and contrast remain fairly even throughout which makes the film quite easy to watch.

    The film is presented in its original 1.29:1 aspect ratio and is not 16x9 enhanced (nor should it be).

    The image is generally quite sharp, particularly for a black and white feature. The contrast is reasonably good, although the light level flickers throughout the feature, and the detail in the particularly dark scenes is very good. The level of grain is quite light throughout.

    Film artefacts are visible in every frame but the degree varies constantly. Some points are particularly worse than others and the degree of artefacts occasionally varies mid-scene (such as at 42:46), which is the only point they really get distracting. For the most part, the film artefacts merely emphasise the era of the film rather than rendering it hard to watch. There are no significant MPEG compression related artefacts visible in the transfer.

    The English subtitles are quite poor. Despite the subtitles over the opening credits being a bold yellow, all the subtitles over the main feature are white and frequently overlap the white German intertitles that they translate. Consequently, the subtitles are often quite hard to read. Worse still are the translations themselves, many of which are all too literal word-for-word translations of the German intertitles that conjure grammatical nightmares and often mangle the real meaning of the intertitles. Forget trying to understand any of the subtleties contained in the language used in the original inter-titles, it is hard enough deciphering the mangled subtitles. There are even occasional spelling mistakes, such as "looses" instead of "loses" at 66:05. At the start of each part of the film there is an incomplete translation (it cuts off mid-sentence!) of a block of text that explains the restoration process undertaken on this cut of the film.

    Both discs in this set are RSDL discs. The layer change occurs at 75:14 on the first disc and 43:20 on the second. Neither layer break was noticeable on my equipment.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    A newly written and recorded score is provided for this silent film. The score is presented in a 5.1 Dolby Digital (448 Kbps) and a 2.0 Dolby Digital (224 Kbps) format.

    The orchestral score was written and recorded by German composer Aljoscha Zimmermann, who specialises in scores for silent films. Whilst the score fits the film fairly well it is rather repetitive. The recording is crystal clear, perhaps a little too much so as the pristine studio-recorded nature of the music is occasionally hard to marry up to the aged look of the film. A slightly less perfectly recorded score may have captured the mood a little better.

    The surround field is used to a noticeable degree by the score, balancing different instruments in different speakers to create the surround effect. Rather than make the viewing experience more engrossing, I found the effect somewhat distracting and rather out of character with the film.

    The subwoofer is also used to support the bottom end of the score but does not stand out significantly.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Audio Commentary

    Audio commentary for parts of the film is provided Adrian Martin, a research fellow in film studies from Melbourne's Monash University. Martin provides three spells of commentary, each lasting around 40 minutes, at different points of the film. He discusses Fritz Lang, techniques employed by Lang in the film, how Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler fits into Lang's wider body of work, the history of the era in which the film is set and plenty more. The commentaries are quite interesting, certainly well worth a listen, but a bit frantic. The information provided may have been easier to absorb is it wasn't delivered in the rush that it is.

The Music of Mabuse Featurette (12:58)

    A reasonably interesting discussion with Aljoscha Zimmermann, who discusses and demonstrates his technique for scoring the film while sitting at a piano.

Norbert Jacques, the literary inventor of Dr. Mabuse Featurette (9:36)

    A Dr. Mabuse historian by the name of Michael Farin discusses the original Dr. Mabuse author's involvement with the development of the character over the course of this and other Mabuse features.

Mabuse's Motives Featurette (29:56)

    An interesting documentary about the motives of the film and the techniques used by Lang to emphasize those motives. This documentary specifically looks into the intended meaning of many of the artistic set pieces and elaborate shots in the film. Some of the meanings derived seem a little far fetched, but even these make for an interesting (if a little pretentious) watch.

Madman Trailers

    An annoying anti-piracy clip followed by trailers for other Madman Films releases; Wings of Desire, The Leopard, Maadadayo and Umberto D.

    Numerous versions of Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler have been released in various Regions. Several shorter versions of the film have been released in other Regions though these should generally be avoided now a more complete cut is available. The particular cut featured here was assembled and restored quite recently in Germany based on Lang's own notes. Not only is it generally regarded as the definitive version of the film, but the restoration job makes the appearance of this version a cut above the rest.

    This particular cut was released by Kino Video in Region 1 in 2006. That version features the same featurettes seen on the local release, as well as additional Text Biographies and film notes as well as an Image Gallery. The Region 1 release misses out on the Audio Commentary.

    This cut has been released in Region 2 Germany with the same featurettes, but lacking the English subtitles of the local release.

    Though it is far from perfect, the Region 4 Madman release appears to be the best release for English speakers.

    Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler is a historically important film that stands more as a work of art than a piece of entertainment. Film history buffs are guaranteed to find something to love in this film. Casual viewers beware, as this is a film that really requires a reasonable degree of commitment and interest to enjoy.

    Unfortunately the subtitles on this release are rather poor.

    The video is surprisingly well preserved and should please most fans. The new score is functional, but a tad laborious.

    The extras are reasonable in number and interesting.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall