Zirkusblut (1916)

Georg Bertrand is addicted to gambling. The son of the elderly landowner Geierstein had broken his word of honor to his father and was consequently banished from the family home. In desperation, the young man intends to kill himself. But things turn out differently: Georg comes across a traveling circus, whose director, the clown Müller, takes him in and has him trained as an acrobat. Many years pass. Georg has married Alexandra Müller, the director’s daughter, and they have a daughter named Josefine. The little family soon establishes its own circus dynasty, with its own traveling circus, which is considerably larger than his father-in-law’s. One day, Georg’s brother Wolf visits the circus and immediately recognizes its director. Wolf is completely surprised, since he, like the rest of the Geiersteins, had believed that Georg had taken his own life. Wolf persuades Georg to give up circus life and return to his former life. A Geierstein is expected to fulfill his family duties and move with his family to the estate. And so Georg returns to his old life, accompanied by his wife, their child, and his father-in-law. But just as Georg cannot escape who he is and embraces his roots, his wife and her father are circus folk through and through, and decide to leave Georg and return to the circus. Only little Josefine, who hates circus life, stays with her father. For Alexandra and her father, Müller, returning to the circus means a decline in social standing. One day, Alexandra is killed in a fall from a horse.