Die fünf verfluchten Gentlemen

The early sound era in film is of interest for a number of reasons, one of them the frequency with which productions, before widespread dubbing or subtitling, were shot in multiple language versions for the different markets, sometimes with different performers.Some of the footage, such as the inserts here of the Arab natives praying or reacting to the visit of the main characters or the location Long shots,would only need to be filmed once, however..Here three of the main actors appear in both the French and German versions.There is also a different edit of the opening two scenes;in the French,we first see the natives at prayer before we see (first scene in the German)the traveler talking to the girl on the boat.The way the sound of an airplane crashing is laid over the soundtrack,when the news is read of the death of the pilot,is handled differently in the two versions as well.Finally,though this could have something to do with the source material, the audio track on the German print is much sharper than that of the French, which the original 1932 Variety review criticized as "poor."