The Blackguard | |
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Directed by | Graham Cutts |
Produced by |
Michael Balcon Erich Pommer |
Written by | Raymond Paton (novel) Alfred Hitchcock Adrian Brunel |
Starring |
Jane Novak Walter Rilla Frank Stanmore Bernhard Goetzke |
Cinematography | Theodor Sparkuhl |
Production
company |
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Distributed by |
Wardour Films (UK) Lee-Bradford Corporation (US) |
Release date
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Country | United Kingdom Weimar Republic |
Language | English, German |
The Blackguard (1925) is a British-German drama film directed by Graham Cutts and starring Jane Novak, Walter Rilla, and Frank Stanmore. Its German title is Die Prinzessin und der Geiger.
The film was a co-production between Gainsborough Studios and UFA initiating a decade-long series of co-productions which ended with the rise of the Nazi Party in the 1930s. The film was based on the novel The Blackguard by Raymond Paton, and shot at Studio Babelsberg, in Potsdam near Berlin, the first time a Gainsborough film was shot abroad. The film was one of a number of films made in this genre during the 1920s, the most successful of which was the American film The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (1927).
While working on the film, Alfred Hitchcock was able to study several films being made nearby, including The Last Laugh (1924) by F. W. Murnau, which were a major influence on his later work.
Against the backdrop of the Russian Revolution, a violinist (Rilla) saves a princess (Novak) from execution.