The Doll
About The Doll
The Baron of Chanterelle orders his heir Lancelot (Hermann Thimig) to marry. Lancelot flees the women who chase him and hides in an abbey. The prior, short of money, tells him to buy a lifelike doll from the maker Hilarius (Victor Janson) and marry that. Hilarius models the doll on his daughter Ossi (Ossi Oswalda). After an apprentice breaks the doll, Ossi takes its place. Lancelot buys her, 'winds' her at the wedding, and only believes she is alive when she is afraid of a mouse. They run off together. Hilarius tries to reach them by balloon, crashes, and cheers up when he sees the marriage certificate.
Cast & crew
More about The Doll
Ernst Lubitsch directed and co-wrote with Hanns Kräly. Paul Davidson produced for PAGU. UFA distributed. It opened on 5 December 1919. Theodor Sparkuhl and Kurt Waschneck photographed it. The script comes from Edmond Audran's operetta La poupée, with a line back through Delibes's Coppélia to E. T. A. Hoffmann's 'Der Sandmann.'
Themes
Making
The picture opens on a toy hill and a dollhouse. The camera move turns the toys into the town, and Lancelot and the baron step out of that set.
Look
Theodor Sparkuhl and Kurt Waschneck shot the opening transformation from a toy landscape into the street where the marriage chase starts.
Preservation
Prints survive. Kino Lorber and Eureka have both issued restorations, and a copy is on the Internet Archive.
Notes
- Max Kronert plays the Baron. Jakob Tiedtke is the prior. Gerhard Ritterband is the apprentice who breaks the doll. Josefine Dora is Lancelot's nanny.
- Lubitsch later called The Doll possibly his favorite film, and grouped it with The Oyster Princess and Kohlhiesel's Daughters as his best German comedies.
- American showings were few, and came in 1928.
- Kino Lorber issued an English-intertitle DVD in 2007, with the documentary Ernst Lubitsch in Berlin, and a Blu-ray in 2023 paired with I Don't Want to Be a Man.
- Eureka's Masters of Cinema put it in the 2010 box Lubitsch in Berlin, with German titles and English subtitles.
- The Internet Archive identifier is TheDoll1919.
Scenes
- A toy town on a table becomes the real street.
- Ossi stands in for the smashed doll and lets Lancelot wind her key at the wedding.
- She proves she is alive by shrieking at a mouse.
- Hilarius crashes his rescue balloon and then finds the marriage certificate.
Influenced by
- La poupée by Edmond Audran
- Der Sandmann by E. T. A. Hoffmann
Also available
- Internet Archive (TheDoll1919)
- Kino Lorber DVD (2007) and Blu-ray (2023, with I Don't Want to Be a Man)
- Eureka Masters of Cinema, Lubitsch in Berlin (2010)
