| The Adventures of Prince Achmed | |
|---|---|
 Title card | |
| Directed by | Lotte Reiniger |
| Written by | Lotte Reiniger |
| Cinematography | Carl Koch |
| Music by | Wolfgang Zeller |
| Distributed by | Comenius-Film GmbH |
Release date |
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Running time |
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| Country | Germany |
| Languages |
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| Box office | $100K[2] |
The Adventures of Prince Achmed (German:Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed) is a 1926 German animatedfairytale film, written and directed byLotte Reiniger. Since two earlierQuirino Cristiani films arelost, it remains the oldest surviving animated feature film.[3][4] The plot is based on elements from severalOne Thousand and One Nights stories, such as "Aladdin," "Ahmed and Paribanou", and "The Ebony Horse".
Prince Achmed features asilhouette animation technique that Reiniger invented by manipulating cardboard cutouts and thin sheets of lead under a camera, similar toWayangshadow puppets. The original prints featuredcolor tinting. Reiniger also used the first form of amultiplane camera in making the film, one of the most important devices in pre-digital animation. Several famous avant-garde animators worked onPrince Achmed, among themWalter Ruttmann,Berthold Bartosch, andCarl Koch.[5][6][7][8][9]
An African sorcerer conjures up a flying horse, which he shows to theCaliph. When the sorcerer refuses to sell it for any amount of gold, the Caliph offers any treasure he has. The sorcerer chooses Dinarsade, the Caliph's daughter, to her great distress. Prince Achmed, Dinarsade's brother, objects, but the sorcerer persuades him to try out the horse. The prince does not know how to control the horse, so it carries the prince away, higher and higher into the sky. The Caliph has the sorcerer imprisoned.
When Achmed discovers how to make the horse descend, he finds himself in a strange foreign land, a magical island calledWak Wak. He is greeted by a bevy of attractive maidens. When they begin fighting for his attention, he flies away to a lake. There, he watches as Pari Banu, the beautiful ruler of the land of Wak Wak, arrives with her attendants to bathe. When they spot him, they all fly away, except for Pari Banu, for Achmed has her magicalflying feather costume. She flees on foot, but he captures her. He gains her trust when he returns her feathers. They fall in love. She warns him, however, that the demons of Wak Wak will try to kill him.
The sorcerer frees himself from his chains. Transforming himself into a bat, he seeks out Achmed. The prince chases the sorcerer (who has turned into a kangaroo) and falls into a pit. While Achmed fights a giant snake, the sorcerer takes Pari Banu to China and sells her tothe Emperor. The sorcerer returns and pins Achmed under a boulder on top of a mountain. However, the Witch of the Flaming Mountain notices him and rescues Achmed. The sorcerer is her arch-enemy, so she helps Achmed rescue Pari Banu from the Emperor. Then, the demons of Wak Wak find the couple and, despite Achmed's fierce resistance, carry Pari Banu off. Achmed forces a captive demon to fly him to Wak Wak. However, the gates of Wak Wak are locked.
He then slays amonster who is attacking a boy namedAladdin. Aladdin tells of how he, a poor tailor, was recruited by the sorcerer to retrieve amagic lamp from a cave. When Aladdin returned to the cave entrance, the sorcerer demanded the lamp before letting him out. Aladdin refused, so the sorcerer sealed him in. Aladdin accidentally released one of thegenies of the lamp and ordered it to take him home. He then courted and married Dinarsade. One night, Dinarsade, Aladdin's magnificent palace, and the lamp disappeared. Blamed by the Caliph, Aladdin fled to avoid being executed. A storm at sea cast him ashore at Wak Wak. When he tried to pluck fruit from a "tree", it turned into a monster and grabbed him, but Achmed killed it.
Achmed realizes the sorcerer had been responsible for Aladdin's fate, and is further enraged. He also reveals to Aladdin that his palace and the lamp were stolen by the sorcerer because of his obsession for Dinarsade. Then, the witch arrives. Since only the lamp can open the gates, she agrees to attack the sorcerer to get it. They engage in a magical duel, each transforming into various creatures (Sorcerer transforms into a lion, a scorpion, a vulture and asea serpent and Witch transforms into a snake, a rooster and a whale). After a while, they resume their human forms and fling fireballs at each other. Finally, the witch slays the sorcerer.
With the lamp, they are able to enter Wak Wak, just in time to save Pari Banu from being thrown to her death. A fierce battle erupts. A demon steals the lamp, but the witch gets it back. She summons creatures from the lamp who defeat the demons. Onehydra-like creature seizes Pari Banu. When Achmed cuts off one of its heads, two more grow back immediately, but the witch stops this regeneration, allowing Achmed to kill it and rescue Pari Banu. A flying palace then settles to the ground. Inside, Achmed, Pari Banu, Aladdin, and the Caliph find Dinarsade. The two couples bid goodbye to the witch and fly home to the palace.
Lotte Reiniger needed three years, from 1923 to 1926, to makePrince Achmed. Each frame had to be painstakingly filmed, and 24 frames were needed for every second of animation (although some sources mentions 18 frames per second).[9][10] Reiniger chose theArabian Nights for adaptation because she wanted to show events that could only be depicted with animation. Reiniger's team consisted of her husbandCarl Koch,Walter Ruttmann,Berthold Bartosch, Alexander Kardan and Walter Turck. A Berlin banker named Louis Hagen financed the movie, and offered the attic of the garage in his vegetable garden as studio.Oskar Fischinger made a wax-slicing machine which was used to visualize magic in several scenes. Another tool was an early version of themultiplane camera. Stars were made by holding a cardboard with small holes in front of a strong light, superimposed pieces of semitransparent tissue paper was used to make waves, and silver paper for moonlit water. For other movable backgrounds, which sometimes included the use of two negatives, they made different layers covered with substances like sand, paint and soap. For the latter, Bartosch would later say about the production ofPrince Achmed: "During my years of work I have learned many things. Soap, it is quite extraordinary, with soap one can do everything."[9][11]
The movie was at first rejected by all theaters, and they failed to find a distributor. So the premiere was a privately sponsored press screening. The invitations were sent mostly by postcards. Among the invited wereFritz Lang and as many people from the media in addition to other filmmakers as possible.Bertolt Brecht helped them by inviting several prominent persons he knew. More than 2000 people showed up.[12]
A segment was apparently cut from the movie, where a Chinese Emperor and a boy is about to kiss.[10][13] This part was later said to be released separately as Der scheintote Chinese (The Seemingly-Dead Chinaman, 1928).[12] But there is no documentation that a several minutes long independent story about Chinese characters act as an intermezzo in a linear movie about an Arabic adventure, and with no relevance for the main story or the rest of the movie, which makes it likely that it was always a standalone short.
While the original film featured color tinting, prints available just before the restoration had all been in black and white. Working from surviving nitrate prints, German and British archivists restored[14] the film during 1998 and 1999, including reinstating the original tinted image by using theDesmet method.
English-market DVDs were released, distributed byMilestone Films and available inNTSCR1 (fromImage) andPALR2 (from theBFI).[15] Both versions of the DVD are identical. They feature both an English-subtitled version (the intertitles are in German) and an English voice-over.
An homage to this film can be spotted inDisney'sAladdin (1992); a character named Prince Achmed has a minor role in the film. The art style also served as inspiration for theSteven Universe episode "The Answer".[16]
The original score was composed by German composerWolfgang Zeller in direct collaboration with the animation of the film. Reiniger createdphotograms for the orchestras, which were common in better theatres of the time, to follow along the action.[17]
The film made $100,156 during a 2007 re-issue.[2] It has a100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 21 reviews. The site's critics consensus reads, "The Adventures of Prince Achmed's exquisitely crafted visuals are more than matched by its utterly enchanting story."[27]
