Mädchenhandel (1927)

The young Berlin dancer Ida Schulz sells cigarettes in nightclubs to earn some money for her dance lessons. A very distinguished-looking guest offers her an engagement at the Purpur-Paradies variety theater in Budapest. Believing she can advance her career more quickly abroad, she accepts the offer with her parents’ consent. Around the same time, the painter Irene Wendland is offered a job as travel companion to the glamorous Frau Aranka von Erdödyi, through the supposed Athens police official Arut Akkunian. In reality, both young women fall into the hands of the same pair of traffickers and end up at the Elysium brothel in Athens. With the help of a fellow captive, they manage to escape. Irene’s fiancé, Geza Farkacz, a lieutenant in the Budapest police, pursues the fleeing traffickers to Constantinople, accompanied by the two women. There they encounter a secondhand-clothes dealer who is none other than their old tormentor. Once again, he manages to abduct the women. Only a major police operation succeeds in overpowering the traffickers, but Ida is killed. At the end of the film, girls emigrating abroad are strongly warned not to accept a position overseas without first making sure it is safe. Anyone affected should turn for help in times of need and danger to the German National Committee for Combating the Trafficking of Girls.