Asphalt (1929)
Directed by Joe May

Film Review

In the late 1910s, early 1920s, Joe May was one of Weimar Germany's most successful film directors.  After establishing his own production company May-Film, he had a string of hits in the exotic adventure line - these included such lavish works as the eight-part serial Die Herrin der Welt (1919), sumptuous three-part epic Veritas vincit (1919) and widely acclaimed diptych Das indische Grabmal (1921).  He ended his career in Hollywood, helming popular genre fare such as The House of the Seven Gables (1940) and The Invisible Man Returns (1940).  Throughout his long and busy career, May was seldom if ever considered a serious auteur or innovator along the lines of his contemporaries Fritz Lang and F.W. Murnau, so it is hardly surprising that, popular though his films were in their day, his name has all but faded from memory.

Even May's worthier films - including Asphalt, arguably his best film - met with a lukewarm reception from the critics and he was generally regarded more as an imitator than as an originator of great art.  Asphalt certainly shows the influence of May's contemporaries - Lang and G.W. Pabst in particular - but it does have qualities that set it apart, and it is hard to name another German film of this era that is so brazenly erotic or so thoroughly redolent of its time.  What makes Asphalt so significant is that it is one of the earliest examples of European film noir, and it clearly represents an important stepping stone between the boldly expressionistic style of Lang, Pabst and Murnau and the familiar doom-laden aesthetic of classic American film noir.

The film gets off to a cracking start with a dazzling montage of shots that instantly convey a sense of the hectic pace of life in modern (circa 1929) Berlin.  A mêlée of long tracking shots takes us right into the heart of the throbbing metropolis, and some manic use of angled shots and camera motion creates a vertiginous kaleidoscopic impression of a city that is constantly in a state of frenzied activity.  The Berlin that May presents is no anonymous urban landscape, but a vast piece of mechanical apparatus that is in perpetual motion - an apt metaphor it turns out for the uncontrollable forces that guide the two protagonists in the ensuing drama to their unhappy destiny.

In its depiction of the spectacular fall from grace of a law-abiding innocent by a beautiful but wantonly destructive female, Asphalt effectively provides a raw template for virtually every film noir drama to come.  The plot is thin, formulaic and contrived to a fault, even for the time in which the film was made, so don't expect any surprises on the narrative front.  Indeed so perfectly at ease does Betty Amann (an American actress shining in her first German film) appear in the role of the wickedly calculating femme fatale that it takes some strain of the imagination to believe that her character is remotely capable of redemption.

Amann is certainly stunning - an unsettling über-sultry fusion of Louise Brooks and Josephine Baker at their most seductive - and from the way her character gracefully slinks her way through the potboiler narrative like a deadly serpent you can see that she takes a demonic delight in the power she has over the male sex.  But do we really believe that this fiend in lithe female form is susceptible to deeper feelings?  Dare we imagine that this creature is capable of being transformed by the power of love once it has been revealed to her?  Scarcely - and this is the film's central weakness.  Betty Amann's seductive siren is more vampire than vamp and it is hard to believe that such a predatory man-eater could be steered back to the path of virtue by anything less than a dozen strong towropes and an armada of trucks.  Maybe cinema audiences were more gullible - or more forgiving - back in 1929.

If the 'heroine' (a strange epithet for one so innately vile) feels a tad two-dimensional, her male 'victim' (a silly little boy unconvincingly made up as a full-grown man) is doubly so.  Gustav Fröhlich had already proved himself to be a very capable actor in Fritz Lang's Metropolis (1927) but in Asphalt he has his work cut out for him, cast as a rookie cop torn between duty and desire.  It is hardly a fair contest as Fröhlich's character falls prey to the most irresistible slab of female pulchritude in the northern hemisphere, and there is a galling inevitably about the ease and rapidity with which Fröhlich is hooked and seduced by the lethally cunning Amann.  It is no small exaggeration to say that the actor redeems the entire film with the torrent of conviction he brings to his portrayal as guilt, jealousy and despair rip apart his character's thin outer shell and reveal the fragile soul within, one that is cruelly decimated by the most potent and destructive of emotions.

The plot and characters may be the stuff of low grade melodrama, but the exemplary performances from the two charismatic lead actors give it a striking sense of reality and the film packs a powerful punch in spite of its jarring contrivances.  Asphalt is a film that beguiles from its first shot and goes on enchanting right up until its final devastating image.  Joe May should be acknowledged for his deft artistic handling of the fairly routine subject matter, but if plaudits are to be handed out his cinematographer Günther Rittau and set designer Erich Kettelhut are equally deserving of praise, for they contribute just as much to the film's enchanting visual design.

Rittau's work on Lang's Metropolis and Josef von Sternberg's Der blaue Engel (1930) has been widely lauded, but his contribution to Asphalt is no less impressive.  Of particular note are his masterfully composed close-ups, which make inter-titles superfluous and reveal so much of the protagonists' innermost feelings.  If Asphalt ultimately overcomes our scepticism and persuades us that a bad girl can be redeemed by love, this is in no small measure down to the depth of human feeling that Günther Rittau allows to percolate through every shot (helped by two incredibly gifted performers).  One of the last silent films to be made in Germany, Asphalt is so visually expressive, so steeped in genuine emotion that the absence of sound barely registers.

Film Synopsis

The son of a respected police chief, Albert Holk is a young police constable who takes his duties seriously - until the fateful day when Else Kramer enters his life.  Called to arrest Else after she has been caught stealing a diamond from a Berlin jewellers', Albert is putty in Else's hands and, seeing an easy victim, the fatal female takes a delight in moulding him to her will.  First she appeals to his good nature by getting him to drive her back to her apartment to collect her papers.  Then she turns on the waterworks as she feeds him the lie that she only steals from dire necessity.  How could the schmuck take her into custody after this display?  And yet he still resists!  Else has one last card up her sleeve and she plays it with the deadliest of female guile.  No man can resist the forbidden fruit when it is offered to him so freely!  The next day, knowing that he has failed in his duty, Albert is racked with guilt.  But whilst knowing he has disgraced his uniform he cannot get the bewitching Else out of his head.  It is some terrible magnetic force that draws him back to her apartment, but as he declares his love for Else she reveals exactly the kind of woman she is.  It is at this inopportune moment that Else's former lover shows up and gets into a fierce tussle with Albert.  The constable gains the upper hand but to his horror he realises he had killed his rival!  This is when Else realises how much she really does love Albert - enough to sacrifice herself to save him from dishonour...