Anita Berber was not just an extraordinary dancer; she also acted on stage and in twenty-six films (according to what we know so far). Many of these films were destroyed definitively or, at least for the moment, are to be considered lost. The discovery and restoration of Die Drei Marien und der Herr von Marana (1922, director: Reinhold Schünzel) is a real victory for all people dedicated to recovering films considered lost for decades. Today Anita’s most studied film is still missing, the documentary Moderne tänze / Tänze des Grauens, des Lasters und der Ekstase in which she dances her most famous routines. Our knowledge of this film is based on just some remaining stills. For Anita Berber film work was just something on the side, and something she did almost always for economic reasons. She was discovered by director Richard Oswald in 1918 when she played the part of the ballerina Grisi in the film Franz Schubert. Das Dreimäderlhaus. Examined again by the censorship board in 1921, this film was prohibited to minors. Dida Ibsens Geschichte loosely based on works by Marquis de Sade and the film Das Tagebuch einer verlorenen, an adaptation of Margarete Böhme’s novel, opened in German cinemas in November 1918, but the latter was banned in 1922. In the second part of the film Peer Gynt Anita Berber dances and gallops about during a trip toward the East. From 1918 to 1919 Oswald shot the film Die Reise um die Erde in 80 Tagen, but due to an argument with Jules Verne’s heirs the title had to be changed. Despite it all, the film was an enormous success. In 1919 Oswald brought the first film about homosexuality to the screen, Anders als Andern, for which he had sought the advice of the famous researcher Magnus Hirschfeld. In this film Anita acted the part of the sister of a gay violinist being blackmailed for his sexuality. Anita often played a prostitute like in Die Prostitution (Das gelbe Haus) and Falschspieler. Important actors performed with her, including Conrad Veidt, Hans Albers, Reinhold Schünzel, Werner Krauss and Paul Wegener, with whom she shared a sincere friendship. In the first part of the film Dr. Mabuse (Der große Spieler) she was Aud Egede Nissen’s double in the dance scenes, but her name was not credited. In her last film, Irrlichter der Tiefe, the tale of a mining tragedy, Anita performed her famous dance Astarte.

(Lothar Fischer)

Programme curated by Alessandro Marotto in collaboration with Lothar Fisher e Paolo Caneppele