ABSTRACT

Although Wolfgang Staudte had already scripted several literary texts for film adaptations, Der Untertan was the first feature-length literary adaptation he directed. 1 Later he went on to film, among others a fairy-tale by Wilhelm Hauff, the Dutch novel Ciske de Rat (1955) and such classics as Gerhart Hauptmann's play Rose Bernd (1956), Bertolt Brecht's musical The Threepenny Opera (Die Dreigroschenoper, 1963), and Jack London's The Sea Wolf (Der Seewolf, 1971). Of all Staudte's adaptations, Der Untertan resembles its literary source most closely in tone, and of all his films it contains the most daring and imaginative mise-en-scène. To appreciate fully how Staudte implemented his cinematic know-how in this adaptation, we must first briefly examine the source and inspiration.