Die Bacchantin (1924)

Baron Fichtner, a widowed steel magnate, has met and fallen in love with the seductive femme fatale and actress Hedwig Valmore, and is determined to marry her. To avoid arguments with his daughter Lotte, he decides to keep the marriage secret for the time being. Meanwhile, Lotte Fichtner is traveling in Italy with Aunt Nelly, where she meets the celebrated artist Markus Staufer and quickly falls in love with him. During the sessions in which Lotte poses for the melancholic sculptor, she learns from him that he was once married. Lotte discovers in the newspaper that her father has married and sets off to meet him on his honeymoon. When father and daughter Fichtner come face to face, Lotte can scarcely believe her eyes: Baron Fichtner’s new wife is none other than Staufer’s former wife! The shock makes the sensitive Lotte seriously ill at once. Meanwhile, the Baron is in a buying mood and is determined to acquire Staufer’s statue, called “The Bacchante.” Lotte had posed for it, but, to the Baron’s surprise, it bears the features of his new wife. The artwork is to be a love gift for Hedwig. Lotte, for her part, is desperate to prevent the new Baroness Fichtner from ever running into her ex-husband and Lotte’s beloved, Markus, and asks her artist friend to leave as soon as possible. When Hedwig Valmore sees the statue, she realizes that her former husband has evidently never been able to break free of her completely. As Valmore looks at herself in the statue, Sergej Urowitsch, a Russian who is an ardent admirer of her acting, rushes toward her. The statue topples, and Hedwig is crushed to death by the falling Bacchante.