Robert und Bertram (1939)

The film is set in the Biedermeier period, in 1839. The cheerful vagrants Robert and Bertram escape from prison and arrive at an inn. There they are warmly welcomed by Lenchen, the innkeeper’s much-courted daughter. A slippery creditor, Fritz Biedermeyer, pressures the indebted innkeeper to give Lenchen to him as his wife; the simple-minded farmer Michel also woos her, but has to leave for military service. At a wedding at the inn, Robert and Bertram steal a wallet, but find a letter inside instead of money, exposing Biedermeyer’s machinations. Out of gratitude, they decide to help Lenchen. They travel to Berlin, sneak into a soirée hosted by the nouveau-riche Jewish Commercial Councillor Ipelmeyer, and steal jewelry. After a wild escape, they send the jewelry to the innkeeper, thereby freeing Lenchen. Michel returns as a corporal, having become a “real man,” and aggressively claims her as his fiancée. In a scene added later, the ruler, recognizably Friedrich Wilhelm IV, shows mercy to the “petty crooks” in the manner of Nazi films, since they had not acted out of self-interest. Even so, Robert and Bertram continue fleeing. Disguised as women, they end up at a fair, are unmasked, and escape in a tethered balloon. Michel prevents the gendarmes from shooting, and the two drift up into the sky, where lightly clad throngs of angels welcome them warmly.