I've been watching the proto-noirs of this era and this is the first film which I would say fits smack dab in the subjective category of pure noir. A grimy city, stark photography, a femme fatale, an unapologetic somber ending, and even a wrongly-accused man. At the close of the silent era, this UFA production with all the big names in the German film industry made what Hollywood was doing look amateurish. I loved the scenes early on showing the traffic in Berlin, Opel 4/16s trying to compete with double-decker buses and our hapless hero the traffic cop stuck in the middle of the chaos. I could have done with a little more help from the inter-titles, many utterances went unwritten. But then again, words just get in the way anyway.
