Cinema
Pan
Harald Schwenzen · 1922
Synopsis
Adapted from Knut Hamsun's book, the film follows Lieutenant Thomas Glahn, a dark and sensual man who has withdrawn to Nordland to live as close to nature as possible, with a hunting companion. Around him revolve the wealthy merchant Mack, his daughter Edvarda, the local doctor and the young Eva. The film keeps from the book its two narrators, its retrospective gaze and its division into two parts, the second set in India; its intertitles quote the text for the most part.
Context
The film was released on 16 October 1922; it is Schwenzen's only directorial work, and he also wrote the screenplay. According to Lisbeth Pettersen Wærp, in the journal Nordlit, the first part was shot at Melbu, in Vesterålen, and the second in Algeria, for economy. It is not the first adaptation of Hamsun, Markens grøde having been filmed in 1921, but the first of the four drawn from Pan. The Norwegian Film Institute restored it, and the National Library digitised it in 2012.
Who it is for
A 1922 silent film whose intertitles reproduce Hamsun's text, for those who want to see the book take shape in Nordland.
Prizes and reception
The critics of 1922 praised its fidelity to the book and its images of Nordland; Anja Breien saw it in 2000 as the best Hamsun adaptation.
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