The Murderer Dmitri Karamazov (1931) (2025)

Popular reviews

• Review by sakana1 ★★★ 2

  Praise for The Murderer Dimitri Karamazov in 1931 focused primarily on Russian director Fyodor Otsep (I guess he was the only credited director then?), and the way he doesn't allow the presence of sound to define his film. Instead, Otsep focuses on images and rhythms as silent directors had done — silent landscapes, trains representing relationships, manic editing (by Otsep himself, along with Hans von Passavant) which lovingly and repeatedly references cinematic tradition from which he came.

  It is praise very much rooted in the moment, emerging from a time in which, in the eyes of critics, German sound film hadn't yet regained the mobility and dynamism that made its silent cinema great. In that context, Otsep's work must have…

• Review by Adriana Scarpin ★★★

  Karamazoff estreava há 90 anos em Berlim.
  Bem superior à versão hollywoodiana, mas sempre acho que Dostoievski não funciona no cinema em sua totalidade e aqui não é diferente, mas uma coisa tenho que louvari: colocaram Fritz Rasp como o Smerdinha (sorry, esse é o apelido carinhoso que dei àquela personagem asquerosa desde que li o livro). Rasp sempre fica com as personagens asquerosas nos filmes que trabalha e meio que se tornou um ícone por causa disso e acaba sendo a melhor coisa dos filmes.
  No youtube ( youtu.be/A98tbzeshE0 )

• Review by Lencho of the Apes ★★★½ 3

  Vivid, kinetic Weimar stuff, leaning maybe toward the Soviet esthetic. Pretty impressive for a second-tier movie.

• Review by Sally Jane Black

  As I have perhaps mentioned before, I am not the most literate human being out there. I enjoy reading, and I've read a lot of books. But I am not well versed in the classics, and thus, I had to look up whether this was based on The Brothers Karamazov or not (It is!). Frankly, all I knew of the novel was its name, but it seemed a distinct enough name that it might not have been coincidence (it wasn't!). That said, I cannot possibly tell you how faithful an adaptation this was; I have no idea.

  It was, however, a decent film on its own. Anna Sten is especially great in the role of Gruschenka, and Fritz Rasp seems…

• Review by AndreIron ★★★★★

  I associate Russian novels and their adaptations with sprawl-this takes the opposite tack and distills the story to what is essentially an extremely, morally circular, very vivid vignette. It's also reconfigured from the top up to be an almost purely visual experience: amidst smoky, cluttered sets and shadowy rooms, the camera glides and even dances with a frenzy, interrupted by iconic expressionist poses & decor.

• Review by Miguel

  Jorge Luis Borges

  em

  Sur, n. 3, inverno de 1931

  
  Escrevo minha opinião sobre alguns filmes que estrearam recentemente.

  O melhor, a uma distância considerável dos demais, é Der morder Dimitri Karamasoff (Filmreich). Seu diretor, Ozep, eludiu sem incomodidade visível os aclamados e vigentes erros da produção alemã – a simbologia lúgubre, a tautológica ou vã repetição de imagens equivalentes, a obscenidade, as inclinações teratológicas, o satanismo – sem por isso incorrer nos erros ainda menos esplendorosos da escola soviética: a omissão absoluta de caracteres, a simples antologia fotográfica, as grosseiras seduções do Comitê. (Dos franceses, nem falo: seu único e simples afã, até agora, tem sido o de não parecerem norte-americanos – risco que lhes prometo não correm). Desconheço…

• Review by Sol ★★★

  The Murderer Dmitri Karamazov (Der Mörder Dimitri Karamasoff) is a German dramatic film directed by Erich Engels and Fedor Ozep. It is based on motifs from Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov.
  
  Dimitri despite having a tense relationship with his father, knows that he has the help of his old man to be able to formalize his ties with his beloved Katja. However, when he goes to visit him, he learns that his father is also in love, with an even younger gypsy woman, to whom he dedicated all his love, and that she was once his servant, Gruschenka. Dmitri goes against Gruschenka to dissuade her from the idea of marrying her father and allows himself to be seduced by…

• Review by Citizen_K ★★★

  Director Fyodor Otsep (aka., Fedor Ozep) was a filmmaker of some importance but his name and works in the past were not invoked much outside of specialty movie reference books such as Georges Sadoul's Dictionary of Films. The internet, of course, has made it easier to know more about him and even to see his once-impossible-to-find films.

  He started as an early writer on film, then moved into screenwriting and direction; his first important film also being his directorial debut, the popular Soviet serial Miss Mend in 1926. He then worked in Germany and France in the 1930s. Moving to America in the 1940s, his career was spotty and his output obscure before his early death in 1949.

  Der Mörder…

• Review by Neidhammel ★★★★

  Blutige Nebeltänze, "Zigeunerjazz" und der sich drehende, feuerrot glühende Kronleuchter.
  In Sibirien leben auch Menschen.

• Review by Annie

  This is my fourth film adaptation of one of my favorite books. It’s an excellent movie, and a solid adaptation of a sliver of the book. Everything but Dmitri’s immediate story has been pared away. No backstory, no conversation, no subplots, no philosophy, no dreams, no Alyosha. (!!) And while my heart prefers the messy enthusiasm of the Yul Brynner version that tries to pack in so many of those things, I admit that, for what this is, it’s basically perfect – intense, coherent, full of anger and despair and joy. It’s a real loss that anyone unfamiliar with the book won’t understand the characters like I do. But, the camerawork! There’s a party scene where we see Dmitri gazing…

• Review by Paul Elliott ★★★

  The Murderer Dimitri Karamazov, directed by Erich Engel in 1931, is an ambitious adaptation of the pivotal narrative from Fyodor Dostoevsky’s monumental novel The Brothers Karamazov. The film attempts to distil the complex themes of morality, familial tension, and existential inquiry into a concise cinematic experience. While it succeeds in capturing some of the novel's dramatic intensity, it faces challenges in encapsulating the depth and nuance of its source material. Set against the backdrop of 19th-century Russia, the film focuses on the tumultuous life of Dimitri Karamazov, the eldest of the Karamazov brothers, who finds himself embroiled in a web of passion, jealousy, and patricide. The narrative, steeped in psychological and ethical dilemmas, is driven by Dimitri's tumultuous relationships with…

• Review by Jade ★★★★½

  What glorious camerawork: the party, the murder, that coach ride? This is so well filmed, and as always Rathaus does wonders with the score. It's also a surprisingly solid adaptation of Dmitri's portions of the book. I do somewhat wish they'd have brought more of the world surrounding this narrative in, but that'd have likely made it harder for those that hadn't read the book. As is, you don't need to know anything about the story to follow the narrative presented here.

  It's a shame the version I watched was German audio with Russian subs because that drastically limits the people I can show this to, and while this is visual enough that you could likely follow along without speaking the languages, you'd be missing out.