The Suffragette
About The Suffragette
Nelly Panburne comes home to London from boarding school and finds her mother has joined the suffragettes. She joins them. Lord William Ascue, an MP who wants a law to jail suffragettes in large numbers, is the man they decide to pressure. The group gets hold of letters that would disgrace him and sends Nelly to use them, with a bomb if the letters fail. She faces him, plants the bomb when he will not bend, then warns him in time. No one is hurt. She leaves the movement. Lord William marries her. The last shot puts her among a crowd of children.
Cast & crew
More about The Suffragette
Urban Gad wrote and directed the five-act film for Paul Davidson's PAGU. The subtitle is Mimisches Schauspiel. Emil Schünemann photographed it. It was shot at the Union studio in Berlin-Tempelhof. The Berlin censor banned it for young audiences on 2 September 1913. The premiere was 12 September 1913 in Berlin. Asta Nielsen plays Nelly. Max Landa plays Lord William Ascue. Mary Scheller plays Mrs. Panburne.
Themes
Background
The film opened in Berlin in September 1913, while British suffragette militancy, including bombs and Christabel Pankhurst's campaign, was still in the papers.
Making
Gad stages a London political story in the Tempelhof studio. The bomb is planted and then called off, so the last act can turn the militant into a wife.
Look
Emil Schünemann photographed the Tempelhof sets, including the confrontation in which Nelly puts the letters, and then the bomb, in front of Lord William.
Music
Silent in 1913. Maud Nelissen wrote a score in 2009 for a screening of the surviving fragment.
Preservation
What survives is a fragment timed at 61 minutes. The 1913 release was in five acts. The Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung holds material on the film.
Notes
- The German title is Die Suffragette.
- German publicity treated Christabel Pankhurst as the model for Nelly.
- Herr Schroot plays Mr. Panburne. Fred Immler and Charly Berger are also billed.
- The letters come to the suffragettes through a mistress of the minister.
- A closing title says women should win by the heart, not by crime.
- Maud Nelissen wrote a score for a 2009 presentation of the fragment.
Scenes
- Nelly comes home from school and learns her mother has left the house for the suffragettes.
- She sets a bomb for Lord William, then warns him before it can go off.
- The last image seats her among a large group of children.
Also available
- Internet Archive (silent-a-militant-suffragette)
Quotes
We women should not win through crime, but through our heart.
