DER VERLORENE SOHN - THE PRODIGAL SON

by Luis Trenker
102’, Germany, 1934

After the death of his best friend, Tonio Feuersinger, an Alpine guide and Bavarian ski instructor, meets an American millionaire and his daughter and saves the latter during a dramatic climb. The father and daughter then invite Anton to move to New York, where he will surely find work. Anton, attracted by that sort of mirage, decides to leave his homeland and mountains and emigrate to the United States. In New York, after much difficulty, he finds the millionaire’s home, but then discovers that the owner and his daughter are away on a trip. All alone, not knowing the language and with no one to turn to, Anton wanders the streets of the strange and hostile city, sleeping on a bench in Central Park, suffering from hunger and the bleakest misery and, finally, the humiliation of the theft of a piece of bread. Anton finds work at last as an attendant in a boxing hall. Here he finds the millionaire and the daughter who, still grateful to Anton for having saved her life, offers to marry him. But he understands that his world is another, gives in to the longing for his mountains and home, and returns to Bavaria where he finds his longtime fiancée waiting for him.
 
 

Luis Trenker Alois Franz Trenker, known as Luis, was born in Ortisei in 1892. After working as an Alpine guide and ski instructor, he studied architecture. Only after the First World War, in which he fought on both the Austrian and Italian fronts, did he come into contact with the world of film thanks to Arnold Fanck who hired him, first as an Alpine guide and later as an actor. His directing debut came in 1928. Following the success of Der Verlorene Sohn (1934), the doors of Hollywood were opened to him. He died in Bolzano at 97.