Destiny

The 1921 silent drama Destiny was the breakthrough film for great German director Fritz Lang (Metropolis). Originally titled Der Müde Tod in Germany, which translates to "Weary Death," Destiny is a mix of supernatural drama and mythic parable created in the shadow of World War I. A young woman (Lil Dagover) finds her fiancé (Walter Janssen) suddenly gone, dead before his time (as were many young men in the war), and she appeals to Death (Bernhard Goetzke) to bring him back. Death (who is indeed weary of his toils) gives her three chances to stop the candle of life from going out, which becomes the framework for an anthology of stories of love and death through the ages: a commoner is condemned by a Caliph for wooing his daughter in ancient Baghdad, a jealous man plots the murder of a romantic rival in 17th-century Venice, and a wizard plays games with an abducted couple for the amusement of the Emperor in Imperial China. Dagover and Janssen play the roles of the doomed lovers in each story, which inevitably end in tragedy, yet Lang also finds redemption in love and sacrifice. Along the way, Lang creates fantastical sets for each story and for Death's domain, a mythical realm built on an epic scale. Remastered from a new restoration by the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation in Germany, extras include audio commentary by film historian Tim Lucas, a featurette on the restoration, and a new orchestral score. Recommended. (S. Axmaker)