''The Grand Duke's Finances'' (german: Die Finanzen des Großherzogs) is a 1924 silent German comedy film directed by

F. W. Murnau Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau (born Friedrich Wilhelm Plumpe; December 28, 1888March 11, 1931) was a German film director, producer and screenwriter. He was greatly influenced by Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Shakespeare and Ibsen plays he had seen at t ...

Plot

The Grand Duke of Abacco is heir to a small and heavily indebted Mediterranean island. The Grand Duke is trying to hide from usurer Marcowitz who demands debt repayment. One hope to improve the situation would be a wedding with the Russian Grand Duchess Olga who sent him a letter saying she is determined to marry him despite not knowing him and against the opposition of her brother the Crown Prince of Russia. Businessman Bekker offers a substantial sum of money to exploit a sulphur mine but the Grand Duke is worried it would have negative effects on his subjects. Bekker joins with local conspirators to organise a revolution against the Grand Duke. In addition, the letter from Grand Duchess Olga is fraudulently obtained by Marcowitz. Thief-detective Phillip Collin, passing as Professor Pelotard, accepts to retrieve from Markowitz incriminating letters written by Congressman Isaac. In the process, he also finds the letter from Grand Duchess Olga and replaces it with a fake. He asks Isaac for a 50,000 pound loan as his fee and tells him that he will use it to speculate on Abacco's debt. The Grand Duke decides to go secretly to the continent to retrieve Olga's letter. Phillip Collin meets an unknown woman in a café, who asks him to help her hide from her pursuers. He willingly obliges and soon finds out that she is Grand Duchess Olga and that her pursuer is her brother. The newspapers report on the speculation on Abacco's bonds, on the outbreak of a revolution in Abacco and on the disappearance of the Grand Duke. All regular voyages to Abacco are interrupted but Olga, who now passes as Collins' wife, manages to charter a ship to take her to Abacco island. She accepts to take along the Grand Duke, whom she has not recognised, and who introduced himself as a supporter of the Grand Duke. Marcowitz boards the Russian Crown Prince's warship and convinces him to go to Abacco by showing him his sister's (fake) letter. In Abacco the Grand Duke and Collin overcome the self-proclaimed president and his accomplices after a short fight. However further revolutionaries overpower the Grand Duke and start preparing his hanging. Olga now understands who he is and wants to buy him off the revolutionaries, without success. At that moment, the Russian Crown Prince take control of the situation with his sailors. However, he is also inclined to have the Grand Duke hanged, for having sold his sister's letter. However Olga dismisses the letter as clumsy forgery. Collin gives back the authentic letter to the Grand Duke which allows him to refute the accusation. The Crown Prince orders an immediate marriage and Collin celebrates the success of his speculation on Abacco's debt.Review, synopsis and link to watch the film:

Cast

In alphabetical order *

Alfred Abel Alfred Peter Abel (12 March 1879 – 12 December 1937) was a German film actor, director, and producer. He appeared in more than 140 silent and sound films between 1913 and 1938. His best-known performance was as Joh Fredersen in Fritz Lang' ...

as Philipp Collins * Mady Christians as Großfürstin Olga von Rußland *

Adolphe Engers Adolphe Engers (1884–1945) was a Dutch writer and actor on stage and in the movies, who appeared in more than fifty films during his career, a number of them in Weimar Germany. Biography Before his career in film, he was an actor on the stage a ...

as Don Esteban Paqueno * Julius Falkenstein as Ernst Isaacs * Ilka Grüning as Augustine, die Köchin *

Guido Herzfeld Guido Herzfeld (born Guido Kornfeld; 1870 – 16 November 1923) was a German stage and film actor. Herzfeld established himself in the theatre in the nineteenth century. In 1914 he made his film debut and went on to appear in over sixty films befo ...

as Markowitz, ein Wucherer * Georg August Koch as Der gefährliche Verschwörer * Harry Liedtke as Don Roman XX, Großherzog von Abacco * Walter Rilla as Luis Hernandez *

Hans Hermann Schaufuss Hans may refer to: __NOTOC__ People * Hans (name), a masculine given name * Hans Raj Hans, Indian singer and politician ** Navraj Hans, Indian singer, actor, entrepreneur, cricket player and performer, son of Hans Raj Hans ** Yuvraj Hans, Punjabi a ...

as Der bucklige Verschwörer *

Robert Scholtz Robert Arno Scholtz (born c. 1936) is a distinguished professor of Electrical engineering at University of Southern California, known for ultra-wideband and spread spectrum communications. See section ''2006 - Robert A. Scholtz and Moe Z. Win''. ...

as Bruder der Großfürstin * Max Schreck as Der unheimliche Verschwörer * Hermann Vallentin as Herr Binzer *

Balthasar von Campenhausen Baron Balthasar von Campenhausen (russian: Барон Балтазар Балтазарович Кампенгаузен, lit=Baron Baltazar Baltazarovich Kampengauzen) (5 January 1772 – 11 September 1823) was a Baltic German statesman who ...

as Adjutant

Production and release

The film is based on the eponymous novel by Swedish author

Frank Heller Frank Heller was the pen name of the Swedish writer Gunnar Serner (20 July 1886 - 14 October 1947), (aged 61). He wrote a string of light books about shady business transactions in an international milieu. His best known works concerned the recur ...

adapted by Thea von Harbou. It was shot from May to August 1923 at UFA's Tempelhof Studios in Berlin, on the sets built by Rochus Gliese and

Erich Czerwonski Erich Czerwonski (1889–1940) was a German art director.Kreimeier p.73 He designed the sets for around a hundred productions during his career. He died in 1940 after being struck by a train during a blackout. Filmography * '' The Black Panther ...

. The on-location scenes were shot on the

Adriatic The Adriatic Sea () is a body of water separating the Italian Peninsula from the Balkans, Balkan Peninsula. The Adriatic is the northernmost arm of the Mediterranean Sea, extending from the Strait of Otranto (where it connects to the Ionian Sea) ...

coast in Split, Kotor, Zadar and

Rab Rab �âːb( dlm, Arba, la, Arba, it, Arbe, german: Arbey) is an island in the northern Dalmatia region in Croatia, located just off the northern Croatian coast in the Adriatic Sea. The island is long, has an area of and 9,328 inhabitants (2 ...

. The film premièred in Berlin on 7 January 1924 at the

Ufa-Palast am Zoo The Ufa-Palast am Zoo, located near Berlin Zoological Garden in the New West area of Charlottenburg, was a major Berlin cinema owned by Universum Film AG, or Ufa. Opened in 1919 and enlarged in 1925, it was the largest cinema in Germany until 19 ...

. It is the only comedy directed by F. W. Murnau.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Grand Dukes Finances, The 1924 films 1924 comedy films German comedy films Films of the Weimar Republic German silent feature films Films directed by F. W. Murnau Films with screenplays by Thea von Harbou German black-and-white films Films based on Swedish novels Films set in Europe Films set in the Mediterranean Sea Films set on islands Films produced by Erich Pommer Films with screenplays by Fritz Wendhausen UFA GmbH films Films shot at Tempelhof Studios Silent comedy films 1920s German films