Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		4.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		4.0

Spione Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov January 10, 2015

Fritz Lang's "Spione" a.k.a. "Spies" (1928) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of British distributors Eureka Entertainment. The only supplemental feature on the disc is a wonderful documentary film produced by the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung in Wiesbaden. The release also arrives with a 52-page illustrated booklet featuring an essay by Jonathan Rosenbaum and an exclusive article by French critic Murielle Joudet. With German intertitles and optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-B "locked".

Just another beautiful spy

The film follows closely two men with multiple identities. The first is Haghi (Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler), a brilliant wheel-bound criminal operating an impressive network of highly skilled spies who has built a massive library of compromising files that allows him to manipulate many of the city’s wealthiest and most powerful residents. The second man is the young and handsome Agent 326 (Willy Fritsch, Woman in the Moon), who has been sent by the government to infiltrate Haghi’s network and bring him to justice.

Agent 326 begins following a few of Haghi’s informers and soon after meets Sonya Baranilkowa (Gerda Maurus, Daphne and the Diplomat), a stunningly beautiful Russian spy who has been ordered to neutralize him. Sonya seduces Agent 326, but in the process also falls madly in love with him. When Haghi discovers that Sonya has compromised her mission, he threatens to destroy her with Agent 326.

Around the same time, Agent 326 is asked to monitor closely Doctor Masimoto (Lupu Pick), an influential Japanese diplomat who has been secretly seeing a young woman (Lien Deyers, Carnival of Love) on Haghi’s payroll. Doctor Masimoto is expected to sign a very important treaty with the leaders of the Weimar Republic that could change the balance of power in Europe and Asia.

Fritz Lang once described Spione as "a small film, but with a lot of action", but only the second part of his description is actually accurate. Completed a year after the legendary Metropolis, Spione is about as big and ambitious as an early silent action thriller can be.

The film is quite long (it is a little over 150 minutes long) and it is loosely divided into four uneven sections, each with multiple subplots that constantly expand the narrative. In the first two sections the focus of attention is on Haghi and Agent 326’s working methods -- both are very much masters of disguise who always manage to be a few steps ahead of their opponents; both are also well aware of each other’s existence and fully realize that it is only a matter of time before one of them dies. (For a long period of time, however, Agent 326 does not know what Haghi looks like). The third and fourth sections of the film focus on Haghi and Agent 326’s different plans to neutralize each other and the events that lead to their decisive clash.

The film’s visual style and atmosphere are fantastic. There is a massive train-wreck, for example, that is shot with such precision that even today it looks quite remarkable. (Considering the size of the camera during the late 1920s, the special effects and some of the interior shots with the massive debris must have required numerous takes to get right). The large panoramic shots from decadent Berlin also look astonishing.

The film’s one and only weakness is the introduction of a couple of subplots that create some rather odd loopholes that are difficult to ignore, but the stylish action more than makes up for them.

Lang shot Spione with cinematographer Fritz Arno Wagner, whose credits also include such masterpieces of silent German cinema as Lang’s M, F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu, and Georg Wilhelm Pabst’s Diary of a Lost Girl.

Spione Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.33:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Fritz Lang's Spione arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of British distributors Eureka Entertainment.

The following text precedes the opening credits:

"The restoration was carried out in 2004 by the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung in Wiesbaden on the basis of a nitrate copy from the Narodni Filmovy archive in Prague. Additional copies from the Filmarchiv Austria in Vienna as well as from the National Film Sound Archive in Canberra and the Cinematheque Francaise in Paris were also used. Some of the original intertitles survived in the Vienna copy, as well as in a flash title in a dupe negative at Gosfilmofond Moscow. The missing opening credits were reconstructed on the basis of the censor-card. The copying was carried out by L'Immagine Ritrovata in Bologna. The master negative of this edit was used for the 2K digital version."

The restoration is very good. While some minor scratches, specks, and tiny dirt spots remain, detail and depth are excellent. In fact, many of the well-lit close-ups look quite spectacular, while the nighttime footage impresses with surprisingly good clarity (see the sequence where Doctor Masimoto meets the girl in the rain). There are no traces of problematic degraining or sharpening corrections. Unsurprisingly, excluding some minor density fluctuations, the film has a very solid organic appearance. Finally, there are a few shaky frame transitions and occasionally light frame instability pops up here and there, but they never become distracting. All in all, this is a good restoration of Spione that makes it quite easy to appreciate the vision of its creator. (Note: This is a Region-B "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-B or Region-Free PS3 or SA in order to access its content).

Spione Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Spione can be viewed with optional scores by Donald Sosin and Neil Brand, both presented as LPCM 2.0 tracks. For the record, Eureka Entertainment have provided optional English subtitles for the German intertitles.

The two piano scores are drastically different. I prefer Neil Brand's score as it has a slightly more contemporary edge and because its harmonic structure is a lot more diverse. Depth and clarity are excellent and balance is very convincing (there are no sudden spikes or drops in dynamic activity). The mixing of Donald Sosin's score is equally pleasing, but its harmonic structure is different and as a result depth varies a bit. Regardless, you should experiment with the two scores and see which one you like better.

Spione Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Documentary - this excellent documentary film takes a closer look at the production history of Spione as well as the socio-political climate in Germany at the time when it was produced, some of the key differences between the German and English versions of the film, and the evolution of Fritz Lang's directing style. Included in it are interviews with writer/director Guido Altendorf and writer/director Anke Wilkening. The documentary was produced by the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung in Wiesbaden. In German, with optional English subtitles. (72 min).

• Booklet - 52-page illustrated booklet featuring an essay by Jonathan Rosenbaum and an exclusive article by French critic Murielle Joudet.

Spione Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Fritz Lang's Spione can probably best be described as a transitional work. It has plenty of the unique atmosphere that makes Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler and Metropolis so fascinating to behold, but it also has many of the basic characteristics that define the likes of Ministry of Fear and Hangmen Also Die. I think that it works really well and even today it still looks remarkably stylish. Eureka Entertainment's Blu-ray release of Spione uses as a foundation a restoration of the film that was completed in 2004, which I thought was quite wonderful. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.