Diary of a Lost Girl, starring Louise Brooks, was released on
this day in Germany in 1929. In this once controversial production,
Brooks plays the title role — the “lost girl”. The film is the
sensational story of a young woman who is seduced and
conceives a child, only to be sent to a home for wayward women before
escaping to a brothel. Beneath its melodramatic surface, the film is a
pointed social critique aimed at German society. The film was
controversial enough to have been withdrawn from circulation and only
re-released in Germany in January, 1930.
More about the film can be found on the Louise Brooks Society website filmography page.
Diary of a Lost Girl is the second film Brooks made under the direction of G.W. Pabst. The first, Pandora’s Box, was also released in 1929. Like Pandora’s Box, this second collaboration was also based on a famous work of literature. Diary of a Lost Girl was
based on the bestselling book of the same name by Margarete Böhme. At
the time of its publication, one critic called it “the poignant story of
a great-hearted girl who kept her soul alive amidst all the mire that
surrounded her poor body.” That summation applies to the film as well.
Böhme’s book was nothing less than a literary phenomenon. First
published in 1905, it was hugely popular, and continued to sell for many
years. Though issued a quarter-of-a-century earlier, European movie
goers in 1929 would have known its story. In fact, German, French and
Polish ads for Pabst’s film emphasized its literary origins, some even
noting that Böhme’s book had sold more than 1.2 million copies. Pabst’s
1929 film, in fact, was the third cinematic adaption of Böhme’s work.
Diary of a Lost Girl debuted in Berlin on October 15, 1929.
By December 5, the film had been banned by the state censor and was
withdrawn from circulation. After cuts were made, the ban was lifted on
January 6, 1930, and the film re-released. Diary of a Lost Girl was
poorly received, not only because sound was coming in and there was
diminishing interest in the silent cinema, but because the film
continued to be censored and cut wherever its was shown, leaving its
already problematic story in shambles.
At the time of its release, the film received many negative reviews –
but for reasons which sometimes had little to do with the movie. As
Brooks’ biographer Barry Paris notes, some German film critics devoted
their columns to savaging Böhme’s then 25 year old book. Siegfried
Kracauer, a critic at the time of the film’s release, was among them. He
commented on the film in his famous 1946 book, From Caligari to Hitler: A Psychological History of the German Film,
writing about the Pabst film and its literary source — “the popularity
of which among the philistines of the past generation rested upon the
slightly pornographic frankness with which it recounted the private life
of some prostitutes from a morally elevated point of view.”
The Berlin correspondent for Variety wrote something
similar, but went further: “G.W. Pabst is among the best German
directors still working here but has had atrocious luck with scenarios.
This one, taken from a best seller of years ago, is no exception. . . .
This time he has been unfortunate in his choice of his heroine. Louise
Brooks (American) is monotonous in the tragedy which she has to
present.”
Though screened across Europe and in Russia, the film faded from view — and film history. Diary of a Lost Girl
was not shown in the United States until the 1950s, and did not receive
a theatrical release in America until the 1980s. Recent restorations,
however, have brought renewed attention, and in the eyes of some
critics, Diary of a Lost Girl is now considered one of the last great silent films — and the near equal of Pandora’s Box.
Under its German title, documented screenings of the film also took place in Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Danzig.
Outside Germany, Das Tagebuch einer Verlorenen was exhibited under the title Tres páginas de un diario (Argentina); O diário de uma perdida and Diário de uma mulher perdida and Jornal de uma perdida and Jornal de uma garota perdida (Brazil) and Diário de uma Pecadora (Brazil, 1954); Dnevnik jedne izgubljene (Croatia); Deník ztracené (Czechoslovakia) and Denník ztratenej and Dennik padleho dievcafa (Slovakia); Diario de una perdida (Ecuador); Kadotetun päiväkirja (Finland); Journal d’une fille perdue and Trois pages d’un journal (France) and Three Pages of a Daybook (France, English-language press); ΤΟ ΗΜΕΡΟΛΟΓΙΟ ΜΙΑΣ ΠΑΡΑΣΤΡΑΤΗΜΕΝΗΣ (Greece); Egy perdita naplója (Hungary); Diario di una donna perduta and Diario di una perduta and Diario di una prostituta (Italy); Diary of a Lost Soul (Japan); Das Tagebuch einer Verfuhrten and Kritušas dienasgramata and Pavestas dienas gramata (Latvia); Diario de una mujer perdida and Diario de una muchacha perdida (Mexico); Dusze bez steru and Dziennik upadley dziewczyny and Pamiętnik upadłej (Poland); Jornal de Uma Perdida (Portugal); Jurnalul unei femei pierdute (Romania); Dnevnik izgubljenke (Spain); Tres páginas de’un diario and Diari d’una perduda (Spain – Catalonia); En fallen flickas dagbok and En förlorads dagbok (Sweden); Le journal d’une fille perdue and Trois pages d’un journal (Switzerland); Bir Kadinin Guniugu and Eczacinin kizi (Turkey); Tres páginas de un diario and Diario de una perdida (Uruguay); Дневник падшей (U.S.S.R.); Diario de una joven perdida (Venezuela).
Since the late 1950s, numerous screenings of the film have been taken
place around the world, including first ever showings under the title Diary of a Lost Girl
in Australia, Canada, United Kingdom (England, Northern Ireland, and
Scotland), and elsewhere. The film was first shown in the United States
in the late 1950s.
SOME THINGS ABOUT THE FILM YOU MAY NOT KNOW:
— Pabst’s Diary of a Lost Girl
was the third film adaption of Böhme’s bestselling book. The first was
directed by Fritz Bernhardt in 1912. The second was directed by Richard
Oswald in 1918. Both are considered lost films. The second version
starred Erna Morena as Thymian, Reinhold Schünzel as Osdorff, Werner
Krauss as Meinert, and Conrad Veidt as Dr. Julius. The film was well
reviewed, but demands of the wartime censor led to cuts and even a
change in its title. Once censorship was lifted after the end of WWI,
scenes thought too provocative or critical of society were put back and
its title restored.
— Along with Oswald’s Diary of a Lost Girl, the year 1918 also saw the release of a film based on the sequel to Böhme’s book, Dida Ibsen’s Geschichte.
Also directed by Richard Oswald, the part of Dida Ibsen was played by
the infamous German dancer, actress, and “performance artist” Anita
Berber, with Krauss and Veidt reprising their roles. The film is extant,
and was shown in Bologna in 2011.
— Elisabeth, the departing housekeeper, is
played by Sybille Schmitz. She was a prominent German actress of the
30’s, and something of a tragic figure. She drank, had multiple affairs,
struggled with addiction, and ended up committing suicide in 1955. The
downward spiral her life took after the second World War inspired the
Fassbinder film, Veronika Voss.
— The elder Count Osdorff is played by
Arnold Korff. He was an Austrian stage and film actor who counted James
Joyce among his friends. Korff also knew Frank Wedekind and Karl Krauss;
one of Korff’s earliest roles was in the first stage production of Pandora’s Box in 1905.
— The tall blonde sitting with the
young Count in the brothel is actress Elisabeth Schlichter, also known
as “Speedy”. In life, she sometimes worked as a prostitute and was
married to Rudolf Schlichter, an important Dada artist and key member of
the New Objectivity movement — to which Pabst’s film-making was allied.
— The sausage vendor, who we first see
out on the street and who leads Thymian to the brothel, is played by
Hans Casparius. He had a bit part in Pandora’s Box, but is best known as a German photographer of the twenties and thirties who was noted for his street photography.
— Otto Stenzeel (1903-1989) is credited for the music for Diary of a Lost Girl. He composed music for films from 1926 through 1930; among his best known efforts is the music for Menschen am Sonntag / People on Sunday
(1930). In the 1930’s under the name Otto Stenzel, he led the orchestra
at the Berlin Scala, one of the largest revue theaters in Germany. He
also led his own swing-style dance band and made a number of recordings,
including a Tango with with the Spanish-born Juan Llossas, who has an uncredited role in Diary of a Lost Girl as the leader of the small combo playing in the corner of the nightclub.
— In 1961, John Huston was beginning
work on a biopic about Sigmund Freud. In an archive of correspondence
about the film, Huston’s longtime assistant Ernie Anderson wrote to the
director that Sigmund Freud had no involvement with the making of Diary of a Lost Girl.
— In 2010, the Louise Brooks Society published a corrected and annotated edition of the original 1907 English language
translation -- notably, this edition, the first in English in 100 years -- brought this important work of feminist literature back into print in English. It includes an introduction by Thomas Gladysz, Director of the
Louise Brooks Society, detailing the book's remarkable history and
relationship to the 1929 silent film. This special "Louise Brooks
Edition" also includes more than three dozen vintage illustrations. (Purchase on amazon.)
More about Diary of a Lost Girl can be found on the newly revamped Louise Brooks Society website on its Diary of a Lost Girl (filmography page).
THE LEGAL STUFF: The Louise Brooks Society™ blog is authored by Thomas
Gladysz, Director of the Louise Brooks Society (www.pandorasbox.com).
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