Spione

Spione
Directed byFritz Lang
Written byThea von Harbou
Fritz Lang
Produced byErich Pommer
StarringRudolf Klein-Rogge
Gerda Maurus
Willy Fritsch
Georg John
Lien Deyers
CinematographyFritz Arno Wagner
Music byWerner R. Heymann
Distributed byUFA
Release date
  • 22 March 1928 (1928-03-22)
Running time
Original: 178 min. (16 frame/s)
Restoration (2003–2004) & DVD: 143 min.
CountryWeimar Republic
LanguagesSilent film
German intertitles

Spione [ˈʃpi̯oːnə] (English title: Spies, under which title it was released in the United States) is a 1928 German silent espionage thriller directed by Fritz Lang and co-written with his wife, Thea von Harbou, who also wrote a novel of the same name, published a year later.[1] The film was Lang's penultimate silent film and the first for his own production company; Fritz Lang-Film GmbH.[2] As in Lang's Mabuse films, Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler (1922) and The Testament of Dr. Mabuse (1933), Rudolf Klein-Rogge plays a master criminal aiming for world domination.[3]

Spione was restored to something short of its original length by the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation during 2003 and 2004. No original negatives survive but a high quality nitrate copy is held at the National Film Archive in Prague.[2]

  1. ^ Wagner, Brigitta B. "Profile". Retrieved 20 November 2017.
  2. ^ a b "Spione". DVD Times. Retrieved 6 January 2007.
  3. ^ Jeavons, Clyde. "Spies (Spione)". London Film Festival. Archived from the original on 29 September 2006. Retrieved 6 January 2007.