Three different negatives were created for the film Der letzte Mann.
One of them was for Germany, one for general export,
and the third for the US A.
The surviving German negative was preserved only incompletely, and was
reconstructed in 2001/2002 with the aid of the following materials:
an original negative from the Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv Berlin:
a print from the Museum of Modern Art, New York,
produced in Germany in 1936: fragments of a duplicate
possessed by the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung
of a missing German print: as well as fragments of a print
kept by the Cinémathèque Suisse in Lausanne.
The reconstruction took place in cooperation with
the Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv, Berlin / Koblenz:
the Cinémathèque Suisse, Lausanne: the Museum of Modern Art, New York,
and the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung,
Wiesbaden.
Labwork: L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna
THE LAST MAN
In the Lead-Role: EMIL JANNINGS
Direction: F. W. MURNAU
Today, you are the first, respected by everyone, a minister,
a general, maybe even a prince... -
Do you know what you'll be tomorrow?!
For tlhe Weddlng Guests
however, due to your period of service of many years' standing,
we've created an open position for you by sending the oldest employee
of our firm to a shelter, effective today.
The reason for this measure
is your old-age.
Here, at the place of his humiliation,
the old man would waste away miserably for the rest of his life
and here the story would, strictly speaking, be over.
But the author is looking out for him who has been abandoned by everyone,
and so he bestows upon him an epilogue,
telling a story that... - unfortunately... -
usually doesn't occur in real life.
A SENSATIONAL INHERITANCE As reported a short time ago,
the celebrated Mexican multimillionaire Mr. A. G. Monen died
whilst washing his hands in the lavatory of the Atlantic-Hotel.
Upon going through his papers, a sensational will for this eccentric man was found to the effect
that the person in whose arms he would happen to die was to become the sole heir to his enormous fortune.
Hence, the biblical promise, that the last shall be the first,
seems already to have been fulfilled on earth,
for the lucky one is... -