M.

M.

Synopsis

"Made two years before Hitler came to power, Fritz Lang’s first sound film is a great psychological thriller, a trenchant treatise on crime and justice, and a vivid portrait of the rapidly disintegrating Weimar Republic. Peter Lorre shot to stardom as the compulsive child murderer who is hunted down not only by a desperate, frustrated police force, but – rather more ruthlessly – by Berlin’s criminal underworld. The extraordinarily detailed police procedures are based on Lang’s research at the Alexanderplatz police headquarters, while the documentary-style depiction of Berlin’s prostitutes, beggars and grotesquely respectable citizens recalls the sharp-eyed satire of artists such as Grosz and Dix. Lorre’s first major screen role was also his greatest – no monstrous caricature but a quietly credible psychopath who could easily be your next-door neighbour. The explosive revelation of his inner torment is one of cinema’s great set-pieces. […] For once, such words as ‘seminal’, ‘unmissable’ and ‘masterpiece’ are not just hype." – Margaret Deriaz