UFA Filmnächte 2025: Der Sträfling aus Stambul (The Convict from Istanbul)

Experience the gripping tale of smuggler Thomas Zezi, freshly released from a long prison sentence, who returns home to find his apartment occupied by his treacherous friend Manopulos and his girlfriend. Enraged, Zezi evicts them and vows to leave crime behind, courting the respectable Hilde Wollwarth and forging a new identity with forged papers. Yet a sudden wave of anonymous blackmail letters threatens to unravel his newly forged life of peace. Shot in May/June 1929 at the legendary Babelsberg studios, *Der Sträfling aus Stambul* is one of UFA’s final silent productions, made simultaneously with the studio’s first sound film, *Melody of the Heart*. The film marks the directorial debut of Gustav Ucicky, illegitimate son of the painter Gustav Klimt, and is inspired by Fedor von Zobeltitz’s 1920 novel *The Lady and the Levantine*. A star‑studded cast—Willi Forst, Paul Hörbiger, Betty Amann, and especially Heinrich George in his last silent‑film role—brings the story to vibrant life. Ucicky’s work on this film launched a career that later included notable literary adaptations and, in the 1930s, UFA’s first major successes in the new sound era. Now lovingly digitized by the FW Murnau Foundation and supported by Bertelsmann, the film will have its world premiere at UFA Film Nights 2025. Composer and multi‑instrumentalist PC Nackt has crafted an original score that complements the film’s dramatic journey, offering audiences a fresh sonic experience as they step back into the roaring 1920s.