Rolf Müller

Based on the real life events of the 1927 Steglitzer Schülertragödie, in which several high school students planned murder-suicides.

This film is a fascinating showcase for Emil Janning's theatrical play. He's a gentle school teacher who believes in his boys and is easily fooled about all things, while the other town officials want him dismissed. Curiously it's very hard to see what the film is exactly aiming for. Disaster strikes and the lax prof proves to be too far removed of the real problems of the world, on the other hand his enemies are shown in the most unsympathetic, satirical way denouncing the militaristic, bourgeois ideology of the Kaiserreich.

Un professeur très autoritaire sombre dans la déchéance en succombant à la passion dévastatrice qu'il éprouve pour une chanteuse de cabaret…