The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser

Original title: Jeder für sich und Gott gegen alle

1974
PG
1h 50m

IMDb RATING

7.7/10

19K

YOUR RATING

Bruno S. in The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (1974)

A young man named Kaspar Hauser suddenly appears in Nuremberg in 1828, barely able to talk or walk, and bearing a strange note.

Play trailer2:50

1 Video

85 Photos

Period Drama Biography Drama History

A young man named Kaspar Hauser suddenly appears in Nuremberg in 1828, barely able to talk or walk, and bearing a strange note.A young man named Kaspar Hauser suddenly appears in Nuremberg in 1828, barely able to talk or walk, and bearing a strange note.A young man named Kaspar Hauser suddenly appears in Nuremberg in 1828, barely able to talk or walk, and bearing a strange note.

Director
- Werner Herzog
Writers
- Werner Herzog
- Jakob Wassermann
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.7/10

19K

YOUR RATING

Director
- Werner Herzog
Writers
- Werner Herzog
- Jakob Wassermann
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 5 wins & 3 nominations total

Videos1

Trailer 2:50

Trailer

Photos85

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
To perform the scene in which Kaspar learns to walk, actor Bruno S. knelt for three hours with a stick behind his knees until his legs were too numb to stand.

Goofs
In a brief scene we see a stork eating a frog with its legs tagged (ringed), but bird ringing didn't start until the end of the nineteenth century, decades after the life of Kaspar Hauser.

Quotes
Opening caption: Do you not then hear this horrible scream all around you that people usually call silence.

Crazy credits
Opening credits prologue: One Sunday in 1828 a ragged boy was found abandoned in the town of N. He could hardly walk and spoke but one sentence.

Later, he told of being locked in a dark cellar from birth. He had never seen another human being, a tree, a house before.

To this day no one knows where he came from - or who set him free.

Don't you hear that horrible screaming all around you? That screaming men call silence?

Connections
Featured in I Am My Films (1978)

Soundtracks
Canon in D major
Composed by Johann Pachelbel

User reviews79

Featured review

9/10

The story of a soul

"This is the story of a soul", someone said and I agree because loneliness is here described through a slow moving plot and endless silences which make us see Kaspar Hauser not as a man but as something more sulfuric, almost a being from outer space. The performance of Bruno S. is simply moving and caused me a lot of tears and the use of time through the narration is perfect for a film of this kind. The poetic vision of Werner Herzog is very peculiar and unique and you can love it or hate it but you cannot ignore it. Herzog doesn't care about the audience, he tells what it wants in the way he likes and that's the praise and the defect of European cinema and it's what makes the difference between European authors and American ones.