The Head of Janus
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The Head of Janus | |
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Directed by | F. W. Murnau |
Written by | |
Produced by | Erich Pommer |
Starring | |
Cinematography | |
Production company | Lipow Film Company |
Distributed by | Decla-Bioscop |
Release date |
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Country | Weimar Republic |
Languages |
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The Head of Janus (German: Der Janus-Kopf) is a 1920 German horror silent film directed by F. W. Murnau. The film was an unauthorized adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's 1886 novella The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, but the source material went unrecognized by some of the German media due to changes in the characters' names.[1]
Released on 17 September 1920 by the Lipow Co., this is one of Murnau's lost films.[2] The screenplay was written by Hans Janowitz, who collaborated with Carl Mayer on the script for The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920). While the film itself does not survive, the scripts and related production notes do. Because the film is lost, its full length is unknown.
Plot[]
Conrad Veidt plays Dr. Warren (the Dr. Jekyll character) who changes into Mr. O'Connor (a parallel of Mr. Hyde). This transformation is brought about, not by experimentation with chemicals as in Stevenson's original, but through the supernatural agency of a bust of Janus (the Roman god of the doorway), which Warren / O'Connor purchases in the opening sequence as a gift for his sweetheart, Jane Lanyon (Margarete Schlegel). When she refuses the gift, horrified, Warren / O'Connor is forced to keep the statuette himself.
It is at this point Dr. Warren first transforms into the gruesome character Mr. O'Connor, and returns to Jane's house in a rage, kidnapping her and taking her back to his laboratory. Upon recovery, Warren is horrified by what he has done and tries to sell the bust at auction, but the hold it has over him forces him to buy it back again. A second transformation proves to be his ruin, committing random acts of violence in the streets.
Ultimately, Dr. Warren as Mr. O'Connor is forced to take poison after locking himself in his laboratory. He dies, clutching the statue to his chest.
Cast[]
- Conrad Veidt as Dr. Warren / Mr. O'Connor
- Magnus Stifter as Dr. Warren's friend
- Margarete Schlegel as Jane Lanyon / Grace
- Willy Kaiser-Heyl as Extra
- Béla Lugosi as Dr. Warren's Butler
- Margarete Kupfer as Extra
- as Extra
- Gustav Botz as Extra
- Jaro Fürth as Extra
- as Extra
- as Extra
- as Extra
Also known as[]
- Der Januskopf – Eine Tragödie am Rande der Wirklichkeit ("The Janus-Head – A Tragedy on the Border of Reality") (Germany)
- Love's Mockery
- Schrecken (Germany) (trailer title)
- The Janus-Head
- The Two-Faced Man (USA) (informal literal English title)
- Dr. Warren and Mr. O'Connor
- Terror (Soviet Union)
Production[]
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A note on the script points to an early instance of Murnau's moving camera. When the doctor is climbing the stairs to his laboratory, Janowitz's notes state "Camera follows him up the stairs".[3]
Reception[]
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This adaptation of R. L. Stevenson's classic novella The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was released in 1920, the same year as an American version, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde released by Paramount Pictures and starring John Barrymore. Swedish film critics of the time found the Murnau production to be more "artistic".[citation needed]
See also[]
- List of films made in Weimar Germany
- Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920 film)
- Béla Lugosi filmography
- List of lost films
References[]
- ^ Hardy 1995, p. 27.
- ^ "Der Januskopf". silentera.com. Retrieved 4 March 2013.
- ^ Lotte Eisner (1973). Murnau. University of California Press. p. 31. Retrieved 6 March 2013.
Janowitz notes Januskopf.
Citations[]
- Hardy, Phil, ed. (1995), The Overlook Film Encyclopedia, 3, Overlook Press, ISBN 0-87951-624-0
See also[]
External links[]
- 1920 films
- 1920 horror films
- German black-and-white films
- Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde films
- Films based on horror novels
- Films directed by F. W. Murnau
- Films of the Weimar Republic
- German silent feature films
- German films
- Lost horror films
- Films produced by Erich Pommer
- Lost German films
- German horror films
- Unofficial film adaptations
- 1920 lost films