Out of the Past 2017 / Hříchy lásky / Czechoslovakia 1929
The dramatic story of a successful rural actor whose life is destroyed by a theater engagement in the big city and by an overpowering love for his much younger wife, also an actor. As the film is silent, there was no problem casting international stars: The four main roles were given to a Czech, an Italian, a German, and a Frenchman.
The dramatic story of a successful rural actor whose life is destroyed by a theater engagement in the big city and by an overpowering love for a much younger wife, also an actor. As the film is silent, there was no problem casting international stars: The four main roles were given to a Czech, an Italian, a German, and a Frenchman. Marcella Albani (1899–1959), who shot over 50 films in her native Italy and abroad, plays the beautiful Soňa. With the advent of talkies her popularity dropped off and she turned to writing novels. After playing the lead, actor and director Josef Rovenský (1894–1937) began fielding offers to portray psychologically demanding characters in Germany. As a director he will be remembered for the lyrical Ecstasy of Young Love and for a quality adaptation of the play Maryša. Cast as the manager, France’s Gaston Jacquet (1883–1970) appeared in 90 movies. German Walter Rilla (1894–1980) started out as a journalist and critic but his intriguing face eventually brought him acting roles. He and his Jewish wife left their homeland for Great Britain in 1933 where he acquired citizenship and often found himself playing dubious characters in anti-Nazi dramas.
Eva Urbanová
70 min / Black & white, 35 mm
Director Karel Lamač
/ Screenplay Václav Wasserman
/ Dir. of Photography Otto Heller
/ Art Director Hanuš Gödert
/ Production Bratři Deglové
/ Cast Josef Rovenský, Marcella Albani, Gaston Jacquet, Walter Rilla, L. H. Struna
/ Sales Národní filmový archiv
Karel Lamač (1897, Prague – 1952, Hamburg), director, screenwriter, and actor, among various other professions, was born into the family of a pharmacist. He studied pharmacology but moved on to film technology and art. He shot newsreels on the front lines of World War I and with the British RAF during the Second World War. As a young man he was often cast as the lover, then he began writing scripts and directing. A true European, he made features and documentaries in Germany, Austria, France, and Great Britain. In 1926 he had a film studio built in the Prague neighborhood of his birth, and in Berlin he and actor Anna Ondráková founded Ondra-Lamac-Film. Back in Bohemia he shot dramas and the first adaptation of Hašek’s Švejk, as well as numerous comedies with the inimitable Vlasta Burian. After 1945 he lived in Paris, the USA, and Germany. An exacting work tempo and a less-than-exemplary lifestyle brought on illness and a premature death.
Národní filmový archiv
Závišova 5, 140 00, Praha 4
Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Tomáš Žůrek
Distributor, Sales Agent
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