Das Haus der Lüge (1926)

The film follows its literary source fairly faithfully: Gregers Werle, the son of the elderly Consul Jan Werle, returns to his family home after a long absence. At a gathering hosted by his father, he learns that his father has been generously supporting the Ekdal family financially. Gregers, who has brought along his childhood friend Hjalmar Ekdal, also knows why: his father once ruined the elder Ekdal and is also said to have had an affair with Ekdal’s wife. Gregers therefore does not rule out the possibility that Hjalmar’s supposed daughter, Hedwig Ekdal, is not Hjalmar’s daughter but is in fact his father’s—and thus Gregers’s half-sister. These secrets, both in the Werle household and especially in the Ekdal home, turn them into “houses of lies,” as the film’s title suggests—places where everyone seems to have settled comfortably into their life-lies and half-truths. Gregers abhors his father’s behavior, so he decides to move in with the Ekdals. He wants to open all their eyes, but above all to tell Hjalmar of his suspicion that he may not be Hedwig’s biological father. But the Ekdals want nothing to do with his attempts to interfere. Everyone there continues to cling to their way of life, which involves a life-lie but preserves peace within the family. Hjalmar increasingly proves to be as weak in character as he is incapable of managing life. The family’s greatest support is the practical, down-to-earth Gina Ekdal, who keeps the family going and provides for it. Hjalmar loses himself in his daydreams, his menagerie—including a tame wild duck—and his “inventions,” which take on outlandish and bizarre forms. One day, old Werle comes by to persuade his son to return home. But Gregers finally rejects his father and now plans at last to tell Hjalmar the whole truth. In doing so, he brings about a catastrophe: Hjalmar harshly rejects Hedwig, and she consequently takes her own life.