Rating: 
Summary: Did Alfred Hitchcock have a mentor?
Review: If he did it could have been Fritz Lang & his seminal talkie, M, made in 1931 & released in 1933. A deranged child murderer is loose in the city (played broadly & wonderfully by "newcomer," Peter Lorre).
The movie has scenes pitting citizen v. citizen, in accusations & counter accusations, near lynchings & mob hysteria. The police seem helpless & bereft of clues. Organized crimes seeks to find the murderer also. He's bad for business.
Crowd mentality is examined. It is a theme Lang returns to in later movies. His first American movie, Fury , (1936) deals with vigilantism & mob rule. This version, a poor print by the way, has English subtitles so your forced to pay attention. It was Lang's favorite film. It is a prototype, if you will, of the murder mystery genre. Kind of a precursor to Hitchcock's thrillers of the 40's & 50's.
Rating: 
Summary: M
Review: M - Regarded by many as the greatest German film ever, the subject of a number of books and many articles, a review from this corner seems superfluous, if not pretentious. Let me leave it with a few impressions. For a classic, M is very entertaining, especially if you're a action/thriller fan. A very young, pudgy Peter Lorre is a revelation in the role of the child murderer, and rightly became an international star subsequently. The print, restored and preserved in 2001, is very good.
Commentary - Anton Kaes and Eric Rentschler seem to know M backwards and forward, and provide a lot of information, the bulk of which deals with visual and thematic motifs. As a plus, they seem to have recorded the commentary together.
Conversation with Fritz Lang - recorded in 1975 with director William Friedkin, when Lang was 85 (he died in 1976.) Provides his version of his meeting with Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, which is a subject of academic dispute. Also interesting for his response to Friedkin's observation that he portrayed the child murderer in M as a sympathetic character. Interesting because a later special feature will make the same point, decidedly less sympathetically, in one of their anti-Semitic propaganda films.
Claude Chabrol's M - A weird little six-minute film. Seems the French were giving the Readers Digest condensed treatment to classic films in the `60s. Includes a short interview with Chabrol discussing Lang's directorial techniques.
M editor Paul Falkenberg - Thirty odd year old audio tape with video images of the film. Falkenberg discusses M with an editing class.
Harold Nebenzal interview - So-so interview with son of M's producer Seymour Nebenzal.
Physical History of M - About twenty minutes worth of material. Some interesting scenes of Lorre's French version of his famous trial scene. Also contains extended scenes from DER EWIGE JUDE (The Eternal Jew), a vicious Nazi propaganda film from 1940 that used clips from M as examples of Jewish depravity.
Stills gallery - Typical behind the scenes, promotional stuff.
Rating:
Summary: ''M' is for Masterpiece and Peter Lorre's best Performance.
Review: M is a masterpiece. The story of a child murderer who is tormented by his own guilt and hunted by both the police and the underworld. Peter Lorre as the serial killer, Hans Beckert gives the performance of a lifetime. Indeed Lorre's performance in this film is the equal to anything done by Brando and Olivier. Lorre both repulses us and makes us sympathetic at the same time. What a pity that Hollywood wasted his talent. He gives very enjoyable performances in many other films, Casablanca and The Raven come to mind, but having seen M, Lorre was capable of much more.
Frtz Lang not only shows us the internal torments of a a killer but a city tearing itself apart as people become suspicous of their firends and neighbours. Also I have never seen a film with so much smoking, quite often you have to wait until the tobacco haze clears to see what is happening. As a smoker myself all I can say is 'Those were the days.'
Watch M and see the best ever film about a serial killer.
Rating:
Summary: "M"= N...for Nightmare!
Review: Peter Lorre is astounding as HANS the candy-wielding, child serial killer of Fritz Lang's justly reputed expressionist masterwork in horror. This is a wicked head-trip into the psyche of THE BOGEYMAN. There is not a single murder shown; yet watching a little girl victim's mother preparing lunch and waiting for her daughter to NEVER return is terrifying. The frame where a TOY BALLOON wafts...like the murdered child's soul...into the heavens is archetypal and has to be among the most frightening IMAGES ever filmed. "M" is nightmare scripted at nightmare pace with claustrophobic camera work. It "corners" you in eerie pursuit of a psychotic pervert (yet again: it never explicitly glamorizes perversion in the sick/slick fashion of contemporary SLASHER films; or pretentious, would-be art films like SHADOW of the VAMPIRE).Lang compounds horror of the story with irony of forces of Evil(The criminal demimonde) hunting Lorre as an equally twisted act of self-preservation in face of ineptitude of the forces of Law.The dizzying implication that Man's LAW cannot protect...nor is constructed to protect...GOOD, but merely exists to enforce ORDER, is presented in the classic Kafkaesque TRIAL where Lorre pleads "innocence" before a Court of Criminals. It is like The Devil being judged by demons in Hell. Fritz Lang's film...like his sci-fi allegory METROPOLIS...remains presciently ahead of its time as cinematic exploration of monstrous Evil. Lorre plays a Monster. He is a premeditated killer living by destroying children...incarnations of whatever innocence and goodness society affects to value...claiming: "it is not my fault!" "M" is the mark of The Beast. It is Fritz Lang's Id nightmare...
Rating:
Summary: Ultra-Classic Film / Awesome New DVD Release
Review: This is a wonderful new release from the Criterion Collection! The quality is far superior to their earlier release of the same film.
Forgetting the extra DVD, the image-quality alone makes this new release all the worthwhile for serious collectors. The screen is entirely fit this time - you'll actually see black bars on the RIGHT and LEFT of your screen, as the film is presented in a unique aspect-ratio that it was originally shot in.
The grain is scarce. The blacks are deep and rich. The dust & scratches are minimal, and this picture yields a much crisper and sharper image than anything we've ever had before. It's a pretty damn good restoration job if I say so!
If this were most other movies in film history, I might agree that another DVD release is a blatant exploitation, but "M" is not most movies. If there is a better version out there of some of these 'ultra-legendary' films such as Fritz Lang's "M", then please someone, make them available to us. I understand that there's been a fairly recent restoration attempt done on Murnau's ultra-legendary "Nosferatu"...where's the DVD release?
At least with this new and largely impressive upgrade of "M", we got it!
Thank You! Worth it for fans.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant
Review: This is Fritz Lang's best. Its not like Metropolis but its worth a viewing! Great performance by Peter Loore, excellent cinematography, beautiful and artistic plot line.
Rating:
Summary: AAA
Review: When does a movie become a classic ? Why german-american director Fritz Lang's M does belong to this film category ? Because of the visual power of certain of the scenes shown in this movie. The lunar face of Peter Lorre will stay printed in our head for the rest of our life, like Leonardo Da Vinci LA JOCONDE. Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt suite will also never sound the same for you after M. Another theme treated by Fritz Lang in M is the psychology of the crowd. Always opposed to the behaviour of a single person, the crowd for Lang is dangerous, it is the place of evil. Peter "M" Lorre says that he's not guilty because he cannot defend himself against his pulsions. Strangely, the people in a crowd adopt the same defense, saying that something stronger than their individual will has pushed them to act in a different than usual way. In his second american movie FURY, Fritz Lang will masterfully treat again this theme with Spencer Tracy as leading character. No bonus features with this Criterion release except for english subtitles. The sound is excellent but images are not perfect : for instance, a white horizontal line appears after 60 minutes on the upper surface of the copy. A DVD which is already in your library.
Rating:
Summary: Haunting and unforgettable masterpiece.
Review: When sound was first introduced into film, the natural response from filmmakers was to use it as much as they possibly could. For Fritz Lang, however, it was to be used sparingly, more like punctuation then narrative. The story of 'M' should be familiar to those who have seen Spike Lee's magnificant 'Summer Of Sam'. There's a killer on the streets, kidnapping and slaying young children, and the police and the underworld of criminals have both set their sights on him. The film doesn't really concern itself with the killer, although he does have a few striking scenes (especially at the film's end where he pitifully tries to plead his case before the kangeroo court of criminals before him) but more so with the dividing line between criminals and police. Both want the killer caught for different reasons. The police want him to end the murders, the crooks want him caught so the cops will ease off their nightly patrols. The film makes these comparisons strikingly clear. It is a powerful film about desperation and fear, justice and innocence. Peter Lorre is remarkable in the role of the killer, his bug-eyed face twisting and contorting with considerable creepiness. His ending monologue is one of the greatest moments in the history of film. Fritz Lang's direction is near-perfect and again his use of sound is breathtaking. The shrill whistling of a tune has never been so frightening before. For all those interested in seeing just how great a film can be, this is one of those must-have films in your collection.
Rating:
Summary: Murderous Molester Meets Mob Mentality...
Review: While watching this story unfold, I found myself on quite a rollercoaster ride of emotion. First, I hated Beckert (Peter Lorre's character) for luring innocent little girls to their hideous deaths. Beckert is scary due to his ordinariness, his gentle face and small stature. He's the opposite of what we tend to expect (even today) a child molester / killer to look like. I really wanted this guy caught! I cheered for the cops to nail this maniac at all cost. Then, I wanted the underworld types to nab him and dole out their version of justice (regardless of their selfish, criminal motives). The scenes of the crooks surrounding / hunting Beckert in a deserted office building are paranoic and intensely claustrophobic. I could feel the terror in Beckert's head. No longer the predator, he was now the prey. Once caught, he is taken to a deserted brewery and put on "trial" by the crime bosses. Beckert must plead for his life before a mob that's not all that interested in his side of the story. He delivers one of the most desperate pleas for mercy in movie history to an audience concerned only with his destruction. Just as the mob leaps at him to tear him apart, the cops arrive, becoming Beckert's (temporary) salvation. In the end, we are left with the words of one of the victims' mother. She sadly states that while Beckert may die for his crimes, this will not bring her baby back to her. Such is the great paradox of justice. Fritz Lang gives us quite a lot to think about in this legendary tale. Buy it and see what I mean...
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