TT Geigenschrey:SONIC INKRAUT present LIVEKRAUTROCKVERTONUNG des Prä-Joker-Stummfilmklassikers DER MANN DER LACHT:Sa.22.3.25 um 20 Uhr,Ort:Forum Factory, Besselstr.14, 10969 Berlin

In the organizer's words:

On Sat. 22.3.2025, the original Joker role model silent film "Der Mann der lacht" (from 1928, by the legendary director Paul Leni with the great actor Conrad Veidt) will be set to music live at the FORUM FACTORY in Berlin at 8 pm, with exclusive Krautrock Free Bop music:

by the TT Geigenschrey:Sonic Inkraut Band,a worldwide unique ViolinDrumKrautband in a new exclusive 5tet line-up with 75 year old Jazzfest and Moers-Fest legend Theodor Jörgensmann,one of the best, rare jazz clarinetists in the world, who made beat music and kraut with cult krauts like Mickie Meuser and Udo Dahmen back in the 60s,70s and nowadays mixes Bela Bartok and jazz with ex- Ideal bassist Ernst Deuker.

Also in the band are Fehlfarben, Der Plan, ex DAF musician Pyrolator aka Kurt Dahlke on the analog synthesizers and, alongside TT Geigenschrey on the electronic violin, Crime and the City Solution and Hugo Race drum animal Chris Hughes on the wild Australian drums. On bass, funk/jazz pro Mark Beumer from the fusion trance jazz band Grey Paris and the Joe Jackson / Peter Gabriel environment grounds the whole thing.

After a long career in jazz, jazz icon Theo Jörgensmann returns with us to his roots, beat music and free beat (as Kraut expert Wolfgang Seidel, a member of Urhippie Kraut founders such as Ton Steine Scherben and Conrad Schnitzler, calls the original Krautrock).

DER MANN DER LACHT - presented by TT GEIGENSCHREY:SONIC INKRAUT - in a Krautrock live film setting with his ViolinDrumBand.*Der Mann,der lacht* is the pre-Joker silent movie by Paul Leni.

- >. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Der_Mann,_der_lacht

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VVK at the collegial Koka36 on site or at: www.koka36.de or at all CTS box offices

or in the evening at the FORUM FACTORY on 22.3.25, from 7 pm (admission)

at the Box Office...

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The first and very longest existing, worldwide only GeigenDrumKrautprogBand "TT Geigenschrey Sonic Inkraut" plays, rocks live exclusively to the pre-Joker silent movie THE MAN WHO LAUGHS, on 22.2.25 at 8 pm in the Forum Factory Besselstr.14 10969 Berlin Kreuzberg not far from U Bahnhof Kochstrasse / Checkpoint Charlie or Hallesches Tor.

TTGeigenschrey:Sonic Inkraut//Live film soundtracks this time again across genres as an all-star band with members of the legendary Fehlfarben (Kurt Dahlke/Synthesizer); Crime & the City Solution and Hugo Race and The True Spirit (Chris Hughes/Drums); Bilders, Mooseheart Faith, Schwefel & Geigenschrey and Renderers (TT Geigenschrey/ Electric Violin & Viola & Wah Wah ao Gadgets); ** as Special Guest: Theo Jörgensmann (clarinets/old Jazzfest and Moers legend, played with many free bebop and hardbop jazzers, incl.Kenny Wheeler, Perry Robinson, Günther Baby Sommer or Peter Brötzmann, John Carter); Mark Beumer (played bass with Grey Paris, The TT Geigenschrey:Inkraut, TT Geigenschrey: Informel, Flonske, Jane Askew of Peter Gabriel and Joe Jackson Band)

The man who laughs -

FilmLiveKrautrockScoring by TT Geigenschrey SONIC INKAUT on 22.3.25 at FORUM FACTORY

Besseltstr. Berlin Kreuzberg.

INFO: Der Mann, der lacht / Original title: The Man Who Laughs

/ Year of release 1928 / Length 110 minutes

Director Paul Leni / Screenplay J. Grubb Alexander / Walter Anthony

Mary McLean / Charles E. Whittaker / Produced by Carl Laemmle

LIVE Krautrock music by: TT GEIGENSCHREY SONIC INKRAUT featuring: MUSIANS / Members of FEHLARBEN, DER PLAN, CRIME AND THE CITY SOLUTION, HUGO RACE, BILDERS, SCHWEFEL, MOOSEHEART FAITH, THEO JÖRGENSMANN QUARTETT.

Movie info:

Lew Pollack

Erno Rapee

Camera Gilbert Warrenton

Editing Edward L. Cahn

Maurice Pivar

Cast

Conrad Veidt: Gwynplaine

Julius Molnar Jr.: Gwynplaine (child)

Mary Philbin: Dea

Olga Baclanova: Duchess Josiana

Brandon Hurst: Barkilphedro

Cesare Gravina: Ursus

Stuart Holmes: Lord Dirry-Moir

Sam De Grasse: King James II Stuart

George Siegmann: Dr. Hardquanonne

Josephine Crowell: Queen Anne Stuart

Duration: 1 hour, 50 minutes and 9 seconds.1:50:09

The Man Who Laughs (1928)

The Man Who Laughs is a 1928 American feature film by German director and filmmaker Paul Leni. The film is an adaptation of Victor Hugo's historical novel The Laughing Man (original title: L'Homme qui rit). The main roles are played by Conrad Veidt as Gwynplaine and Mary Philbin as the blind Dea. The film belongs to the melodrama genre, but its expressionist gloominess is reminiscent of horror films. The film was not released in German home cinemas until 2022.

Storyline:

In England in 1690, Gwynplaine lives as the son of a nobleman. Gwynplaine's father insults King James II and is sentenced to death in the Iron Maiden. As punishment, Gwynplaine himself is operated on by Dr. Hardquannone, a master surgeon of the Comprachicos - jugglers who mutilate people into objects for show. His face is disfigured so that it shows an artificial, maniacal permanent grin, so that Gwynplaine from now on has to make fun of his foolish father forever. Later, however, the Comprachicos, with whom he lives, are banished from England, and so that they are not compromised by him, they leave the boy alone in the depths of winter. After taking a living baby from the arms of a frozen woman, he escapes from the snowstorm into the carriage of the quack doctor Ursus, who takes them both in.

The years pass and Ursus becomes a very successful showman. His main attraction is Gwynplaine, who becomes the favorite of the voyeuristic public as "the man who laughs". The amusement he causes makes him very famous, but at the same time he is plagued by strong feelings of inferiority. The child he once saved has now become the young woman Dea, who is blind and can therefore find nothing wrong with him. They fall in love, but Gwynplaine refuses to marry her because he considers himself unworthy.

Meanwhile, King James II is dead and Queen Anne reigns over England in his place. Her devious court jester Barkilphedro discovers records attesting to Gwynplaine's noble origins and his claim to his father's political power. Queen Anne wants to restore his status, but as his rightful property is in the hands of the Duchess Josiana, he is to marry her to satisfy both sides. When Gwynplaine visits the Duchess, she is both sexually attracted and repulsed by his appearance. This experience confirms to Gwynplaine that he should stick with Dea after all. On his return, he lets her feel his mouth for the first time, whereupon she says that she was created blind in order to love him.

Due to his noble origins, Gwynplaine is taken to the House of Lords, where he is supposed to accept the Duchess Josiana as his wife in front of the Queen. At the same time, court jester Barkilphedro plots against him, as he covets his ancestral fortune: he delivers an order to Dea and Ursus to leave the country. They head for London to set sail from the harbor. Gwynplaine, also on the scene, leaves the furious House of Lords and learns of the presence of his foster family. A chase begins in which he has to flee from Barkilphedro's henchmen, aided by the common people who recognize him and stop the soldiers.

After the ship on which Ursus and Dea are on has already sailed, he reaches the docks and calls out to them. His call attracts the group's dog, which swims back to him and bites Barkilphedro on the neck. Gwynplaine gets into a boat and rows after the ship. Everyone is reunited and sails away together.

The ending thus differs from the original book, in which Dea dies on the deck of the ship during the escape and Gwynplaine drowns himself.

Background:

After Universal Pictures had achieved great success with films such as The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and The Phantom of the Opera (1925), the company encouraged producer Carl Laemmle to produce a film in a similar setting. Laemmle decided to film Victor Hugo's L'Homme qui rit.

Due to his German origins, Laemmle had connections to the German film scene, which helped him in his negotiations with German filmmakers and actors. This enabled him to win over Paul Leni, whose film Das Wachsfigurenkabinett (1924) impressed Laemmle. He also won Conrad Veidt for the leading role, who had already achieved fame through his roles in the films Das Wachsfigurenkabinett and Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari.

Universal invested over one million US dollars in The Man Who Laughs, which was a considerable sum at the time. Charles D. Hall, Thomas F. O'Neill and Joseph C. Wright were responsible for the film sets. The costumes were designed by Vera West and David Cox.

The scenes with Olga Baclanova as Josiana were very daring for the time; there was also a nude scene in the bathroom, but this was cut from the US version.

Reception

The Österreichische Film-Zeitung wrote: "Directed by Paul Leni, who created incredibly impressive, life-filled, historical images and achieved an extremely strong overall effect, it is above all Conrad Veidt whose sensational acting gives the film an impressive artistic character."[3]

However, many contemporary reactions were rather reserved. The morbid atmosphere and the allegedly inauthentic-looking backdrops were criticized. However, today's reception appreciates The Man Who Laughs as an important work of German silent film expressionism.

Although the actor Kirk Douglas was interested in a remake for a long time, the subject matter was only filmed once again for a long time during the sound film era, as The Man with the Golden Blade (L'uomo che ride) from 1966 by Sergio Corbucci. However, Corbucci moved the plot from England to 16th century Italy. It was not until 2012 that a modern version was released, directed by Jean-Pierre Améris and starring Gérard Depardieu, Marc-André Grondin and Christa Théret.

The film influenced numerous other works. Not only was the character of Gwynplaine the inspiration for Batman's arch-enemy Joker, but the masks and make-up of secondary characters can still be found in Joker comics and films to this day[4].

The film The Black Dahlia by Brian De Palma uses scenes from The Man Who Laughs and incorporates certain elements of the plot.

Release in Germany

The Man Who Laughs was shown in German cinemas in 1929 in an edited version with text overlays. This version has since been considered lost.[5] Wicked Vision reconstructed the old German version using the old censorship cards from the Federal Archives and released it together with the uncut version in June 2022.[6]

Literature

William K. Everson: Classics of the horror film. Munich 1979, page 33-36.

Victor Hugo: The laughing man. Historical novel. (Original title: L'homme qui rit). Classic of the historical novel. German by Carl Johann Perl. Bastei-Verlag Lübbe, Bergisch Gladbach 1999, 839 p., ISBN 3-404-14267-5.

Victor Hugo: "The man who laughs" or the exploitation of the unfortunate by the fortunate. (Original title: L'homme qui rit). Translated into German, edited and introduced by Walter Keiler. (Abridged film edition.) M. Maschler, Berlin 1929

Price information:

VVK 20 Eu / 23 B.O.