Directed by Henrik Galeen Brigette Helm – Alraune ten Brinken Paul Wegener – Professor Jakob ten Brinken Following the tradition of Frankenstein Alraune is the story of a girl — the fruit of a sordid experiment… created by a scientist, who inseminated a prostitute with the ‘seed’ of a hanged criminal. Proferssor Brinken is interested in whether it is our genes or our enviroment which governs our personalities — he adopts Alraune as his own and sends her to a convent school.
Sure she will be safe from any wicked influence, he observes her maturation… what will the results of his experiment be? In the middle ages, the mandrake root (alraune, in German) was said to grow where the semen of hanged men fell when they were killed. Galeen’s film is considered the difinitive version of Hanns Heinz Ewers’ novel, a modern retelling of this tale (itself written in 1911).
Alraune (1928)
