City Without Jews (Die Stadt Ohne Juden) Blu-Ray

Based on the controversial and best-selling novel by Hugo Bettauer, H.K. Breslauer's 1924 film adaptation of The City without Jews (Die Stadt ohne Juden) was produced two years after the publication of the book, only a decade before events depicted in the fictional story became an all-too-horrific reality. Set in the Austrian city of Utopia (a thinly disguised stand-in for Vienna), the story follows the consequences of an anti-Semitic law passed by the National Assembly forcing all Jews to leave the country. At first the decision is met with celebration, yet when the citizens of Utopia eventually come to terms with the loss of the Jewish population-and the resulting economic and cultural decline-the National Assembly must decide whether or not to invite the Jews back. Conceived as a dark satire and stylistically influenced by German Expressionism, the film nonetheless contains ominous and eerily realistic sequences, such as the shots of trains transporting deported Jews out of the city. The implicit critique of Nazism in the film is part of the reason it no longer screened in public after 1933, all complete prints were thought to be destroyed. Now, thanks to the discovery of a nitrate print at a Paris flea market in 2015, as well as to the brilliant restoration efforts of the Filmarchiv Austria, this previously incomplete film can once again be appreciated in it's unfortunately ever-relevant entirety.