Madness Rules
| Madness Rules | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Heinrich Gretler (left) as Constable Studer | |
| Directed by | Leopold Lindtberg |
| Written by | Alfred Neumann Leopold Lindtberg |
| Starring | Heinrich Gretler Heinz Woester Irene Naef |
| Cinematography | Emil Berna |
| Edited by | Hermann Haller |
Production company | Praesens Film AG |
Release date |
|
Running time | 113 minutes |
| Country | Switzerland |
| Language | Swiss German |
Madness Rules (German: Matto regiert) is a 1946 Swiss crime film directed by Leopold Lindtberg[1] and based on a novel by Friedrich Glauser. It is one of Lindtberg’s Wachtmeister Studer films and was later screened at the Zurich Film Festival.[2][3]
Background
[edit]Madness Rules is based on Friedrich Glauser’s novel Matto regiert.[3] Heinrich Gretler plays Wachtmeister Hermann Studer. He had previously played the character in Leopold Lindtberg’s 1939 film Constable Studer, which was adapted from a novel by Glauser.[3][4]
Glauser drew on his own experience of psychiatric institutions, and the film presents both a crime story and a conflict between modern and outdated psychiatric methods.[5]
Synopsis
[edit]Wachtmeister Studer investigates a disappearance at a psychiatric clinic after a dance for the patients. The young patient Herbert Caplaun had wanted to attend, but the clinic director Ulrich Borstli refused permission, and by the next morning Borstli has vanished.[2][3]
Cast
[edit]The cast includes:[3]
- Heinrich Gretler as Wachtmeister Hermann Studer
- Heinz Woester as Dr. med. Ernst Laduner
- Elisabeth Müller as Irma Wasem
- Olaf Kübler as Herbert Caplaun
- Irene Naef as Margrit Laduner
- Johannes Steiner as Dr. med. Ulrich Borstli
- Adolf Manz as Georg Caplaun
- Zarli Carigiet as Patient
- Hans Kaes as Portier Dreyer
- Mathilde Danegger as Dr. med. Spühler
- Hans Gaugler as Leibundgut
- Emil Hegetschweiler as Pfleger
Reception
[edit]Writing in Geschichte des Schweizer Films (1987), Hervé Dumont described the film as visually aligned with film noir and argued that its psychological density outweighs suspense and plot.[3] filmo described the film as a suspenseful crime story with a dense film-noir atmosphere, and wrote that while the criminal plot recedes, Lindtberg focuses on the complex network of relationships within the psychiatric clinic.[6]
Digitisation
[edit]The film was digitised in 2009 by Schweizer Fernsehen in Zurich and the Cinémathèque suisse in Lausanne.[6]
Festival screenings
[edit]The film premiered in 1946. It was later screened at the 21st Zurich Film Festival in 2025.[2]
References
[edit]- ↑ Fritsche p.31
- 1 2 3 "Matto regiert". Swiss Films (in German). Retrieved 5 April 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Matto regiert". Filmpodium (in German). Retrieved 5 April 2026.
- ↑ "Wachtmeister Studer". Filmpodium (in German). Retrieved 17 March 2026.
- ↑ "17. Mai 2009: Schweizer Film «Matto regiert»". SRF Medienportal (in German). 17 May 2009. Retrieved 5 April 2026.
- 1 2 "Matto regiert". Filmo (in German). Retrieved 5 April 2026.
Bibliography
[edit]- Fritsche, Maria. Homemade Men in Postwar Austrian Cinema: Nationhood, Genre and Masculinity. Berghahn Books, 2013.
