Mother Krause's Journey to Happiness

Mother Krause's Journey to Happiness (German: Mutter Krausens Fahrt ins Glück) is a 1929 German silent drama film directed by Phil Jutzi and starring Alexandra Schmitt, Holmes Zimmermann and Ilse Trautschold. The film was produced by the left-wing Prometheus Film, a German subsidiary of the Soviet company Mezhrabpom-Film. It depicts the cruelty of poverty and depicts Communism as a rescuing force that, alas, reaches Mutter Krause and the child that lives in Krause's apartment too late. It was shot at the Johannisthal Studios in Berlin. Plot Mutter Krause and her two adult children, daughter Erna and son Paul, live in a tenement in Wedding, a cramped working-class district of Berlin. With them lives "the Tenant", a petty criminal, his fiancée Friede, a prostitute, and Friede's young child. Mutter Krause is a quiet, long-suffering old woman who earns what little she can delivering newspapers. However, Paul is unemployed, earns little from ragpicking and often relies on her for money. One day, he spends the money collected from her customers on drink. Mutter Krause pawns her last valuable possession, a treasured memento of her late husband, but still has not enough to satisfy her obligation to her employer, who sacks her and takes her to court.