CineGraph präsentiert
On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the death of Willy Haas. Haas (1891–1973) belonged to the circle of German-speaking writers in Prague and became one of the most important critics of the Film-Kurier in Berlin in the 1920s, wrote screenplays (including G. W. Pabst’s Die freudlose Gasse, 1925), 1925 editor of the magazine »Die literarische World”. 1933 Exile first in Prague, then in India. Returned to Europe as a British secret service officer, in the 1950s film and theater critic for »Die Welt«.

Tonka Šibenice (Die Galgentoni)
CS 1929/30. Karel Anton. Author: Willy Haas. 82 min. French Intertitles with German subtitles
Mit Ita Rina, Vera Baranovská, Josef Rovenský
Silent film drama based on a report by Egon Erwin Kisch about a kind-hearted girl who agrees to keep a man sentenced to death company on his last night. Socially ostracized, she is reduced to street whore. The film was shot as a silent film and then dubbed in 3 versions with music and dialogue passages. “From the libretto, which Willy Haas very skilfully adapted to the needs of the film, [blühte und verwelkte] despite all the sometimes painful ingredients and omissions, the old, honest, brave tonka Egon Erwin Kisch appears before us.” (Prager Tageblatt, 28.2 .1930)

cinefest — International Festival of German Film Heritage awards the Willy Haas Prize for important international publications on German-language film every year.