Synopsis
Die Nibelungen: Siegfried (1924) is Fritz Lang's silent epic, available to watch online on iFILM — the first half of his monumental two-part take on the medieval Song of the Nibelungs.
Siegfried (Paul Richter), a smith's apprentice, slays a dragon and bathes in its blood to turn invincible — all but one spot on his back, shielded by a falling linden leaf. Carrying the Nibelung hoard and a cloak of invisibility, he rides to Worms to win the hand of the beautiful Kriemhild (Margarete Schön). King Gunther agrees, but only if Siegfried first helps trick the warrior-queen Brünhild into marriage — a lie that sets a chain of betrayal moving toward bloodshed.
Lang and screenwriter Thea von Harbou built the entire world on soundstages: a hand-made forest, looming stone halls, and a dragon roughly sixty feet long, worked by a crew hidden inside it. The rigid geometry and ritual stillness of these frames seeded a century of fantasy imagery, right up to Peter Jackson. Essential viewing for anyone curious where screen fantasy actually began. Stream Die Nibelungen: Siegfried (1924) online on iFILM.
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