The Testament of Dr. Mabuse (1933)

Fritz Lang's "The Testament of Dr. Mabuse"

In January of 1933, Adolf Hitler was named chancellor of Germany. On March 14th, he elected Joseph Goebbels Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. March 24th was the scheduled release of Fritz Lang's new film The Testament of Dr. Mabuse. After a screening of the film on March 23, Goebbels banned the film's release in Germany. What about Lang's new film made banning its release one of Goebbels's first orders of business as the new Minister of Propoganda? 

The film is a sequel to Lang's 1922 film Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler. That film portrayed a contemporary look at the chaos surrounding German society after the Great War. Chaos and frivolity reigned as a mad scientist hypnotized people to perform criminal acts so that he may wield greater power. The film ended with Mabuse being captured by police while his criminal empire collapsed around him. The Testament of Dr. Mabuse finds Mabuse now in a mental hospital for the criminally insane. Although he does not speak, he uses his telepathic powers of hypnosis to enact crimes waves over the city of Berlin. Not only this, he madly scribes his quests for power on sheets on paper, kept under observation by a Professor Baum. Meanwhile, a police inspector named Lohmann searches for a mysterious end to the waves of crime, all leading him to the name Mabuse. The criminal employees take orders from a voice behind a curtain, instructing them to spread fear and intimidation throughout the city. This is done not for monetary profit, as many of the henchmen complain however, but for reasons of which they are unaware. One henchman complains that they harass civilians for money only to 'lay off' when they come up with the money. Another complains that they rob heroin, opioids, and other drugs from pharmacies, only to release them to the public rather than sell them for profit. It becomes apparent that they are not taking money, but rather gathering compliance through fear. After the death of Mabuse, Professor Baum reads his mad scribblings, only to become overtaken by the ghost of Mabuse, instructing him of his plans for a criminal state. The Professor, now possessed by the ghost of Mabuse, carries out the destruction of a chemical plant only to return to his asylum - found in Mabuse's room with a look of insanity, tearing up Mabuse's scrubbings. There, Inspector Lohmann realizes that there is nothing further he can do. 

The film became subject to Goebbels's scrutiny for not just the sheer resemblance to the Nazi's compliancy tactics, but also because Lang placed words made verbatim by Nazis in the mouth of the madman Mabuse. When Professor Baum is reading Mabuse's 'manifesto,' the haunting vision of Mabuse recites, "The ultimate purpose of crime is to establish an endless empire of crime. A state of complete insecurity and anarchy, founded upon tainted ideals of a world doomed to annihilation." Associating Mabuse with the ideals of Nazis while his henchmen harassed the population into compliancy seemed like too much of a coincidence for the Nazis, especially since this 'empire of crime' became so overbearing over a fearful and paranoid population that they overtook the power of the state. Because of the depiction of Nazism in a negative connotation, Goebbels believed that the film "showed that an extremely dedicated group of people are perfectly capable of overthrowing any state with violence." Because of this, the film was banned. 

The film instead had its premier in Budapest, Hungary on April 21, 1933. It was also released in France and America afterwards. Lang wrote a forward for the America release, stating, "The film was made as an allegory to show Hitler's process of terrorism. Slogans and doctrine of the Third Reich have been put into the mouths of criminals in the film. Thus I hoped to expose the masked Nazi theory of the necessity to deliberately destroy everything which is precious to people. Then, when everything collapsed and they were thrown into utter despair, they would try to find help in the 'New Order.'" 

The film not only presents an allegory to Nazi terrorism, but is a fantastic continuation of Lang's artistic exploration in sound. With his previous film, M, Lang revolutionized the way sound can be utilized in film. Here, Lang continues to expand what sound can do. This is especially apparent in the first scene, when police agent Hofmeister is spying on Mabuse's gang, we hear a continuous, repetitive mechanical pounding, deafening to the ears. This creates a sense of suspense and terror as Hofmeister sneaks around the criminals' basement avoiding detection. Once he leaves the basement, we hear a lack of sound, an ambient silence. This creates the heightened and abrupt audio of the crashing of masonry that barely misses Hofmeister. The intense lack of sound followed by the piercing noise breaking the sound further instills the sense of fear in the viewer. Lang continues to experiment with sound and what it is capable of throughout the film, mostly to provide the ambiance of feeling to instill within the viewer.

For the visual aspects of the film, Lang wanted the film to be as realistic as possible. The purposes of this was to remind the viewer that the film takes place firmly in the real world - so the viewer does not forgot that what is happening on the screen is relevant to them as well. With this, Lang utilizes the real locations as well as cinematography that appears unfabricated. Lang does however uses lighting to suggest mood, typically to evoke a sense of dread or terror. The mixture of sparingly used dark lighting combined with realist photography creates a haunting vision of a very real Germany. There is one particular scene in which he utilizes the expressionism he has come to be known for in most of his film. This is the scene in which the ghost of Mabuse possesses Dr. Baum after Baum reads Mabuse's 'manifesto'. The purposes of expressionism is to visually convey an abstraction, usually to broadcast the inner world of the characters into the outer landscape. With this visual abstraction, the possession of Dr. Baum by the ghostly Mabuse conveys the transfer of the venomous philosophical ideals from Mabuse to Baum. Rather than have Baum read the transcripts and then say, "Ah! Now I believe this too!" Lang instead presents the viewer with a fantastical visual occurrence in which the viewer must draw a conceptual conclusion from this visual spectacle.  This piece of expressionism, along with Mabuse's other hypnosis techniques, is the only pieces of visual expressionism used in the film. Later on, Lang would admit that if he could re-do the film, he would exclude the supernatural scenes. Perhaps he felt that the expressionism used was a detractor from the gritty realness of an endangered Germany that he was trying to evoke. 

With The Testament of Dr. Mabuse, Lang continues in his Mabuse saga as he illustrates the dangerous mindset Germany was in during 1933. Mabuse dies in the film, but his influence continues to infest and infect those drawn to his ideals. The criminal syndicate in the film takes orders from a 'man behind the curtain.' However, once that curtain gets lifted in the film, it turns out to only be a recording. Lang is suggesting with Testament that it is not one single man that is creating the downfall of Germany. Instead, it is an infestation of the mind. A society rules by chaos, paranoia, and fear creates a convolution of ideals, manifesting themselves through societal corruption and compliance with a criminal empire. Even though the film was banned in Germany, many people saw the film and understood the evil that was taking root there. The Testament of Dr. Mabuse remains a landmark German film that many look to as a quintessential crime-thriller depicting a society descending into corrupted morals.