The Last Laugh (1924): South West Silents

A landmark work of the silent era, F.W. Murnau’s masterpiece Der Letzte Mann (The Last Laugh) is one of the most notable films made during the Weimar Republic.

The Last Laugh stars Emil Jannings as an ageing doorman whose happiness crumbles when he is relieved of the duties and uniform which had, for years, been the foundation of his pride and which compensates for him living in a slum.

The Last Laugh is not just the plight of a single doorman, but a mournful dramatisation of the frustration and anguish of the universal working class, a clash of the old and the new, and how one individual is lost in the modern cityscape of the early twentieth century.

With an introduction by James Harrison from South West Silents. The film will have a musical accompaniment from Meg Morley.