Das Geheimnis der schwarzen Witwe/The Secret of the Black Widow (1963)

A number of London business- and newspapermen get killed by poison via an airgun that propels an artificial Black Widow spider. What those men all have in common is that they were all members of an expedition to Mexico that brought them riches but also united them over a dark secret. Reporter Wellby (O.W. Fischer) tries to solve the killings… much to the annoyance of his boss (Werner Peters) who was also a member of that expedition. 

 Das Geheimnis der schwarzen Witwe/The Secret of the Black Widow (1963) is the third of four Louis Weinert-Wilton adaptations that were shot with various different production companies. 

Black Widow is again a Spanish co-production by International Germania Film and based on Weinert-Wilton’s novel Die Königin der Nacht (tr. “The Queen of the Night”, 1930). 

The film follows the plot in broad strokes with one notable difference: The murders aren’t committed by a mysterious killer with an airgun shooting fake black widows carrying real poison - highly cinematic though also very impractical in real life - but by a female killer calling herself the “Queen of the Night” through a similarly puzzling killing method. 

In the book the victims also don’t receive missives that tell them to “Talk or Die!”. Instead they get lyrically whispered alerts that “the Queen of the Night from the Fountain of the Seven Palm Trees will wait to the day until the moon enters into its last quarter” that serve as warnings of impending doom. 

Book and film also differ in that characters often get redefined. 

Karin Dor’s character in Black Widow is… yet another typical Karin Dor character: the beautiful heroine who works in an antique shop for one of the potential victims and falls in love with the hero. 

In the novel Clarisse is a colleague of Wellby, a female wallflower who walks hunched over, does nothing to appeal to any of the male characters and on one side of her face is even disfigured by a large birthmark making her downright ugly from that angle. From the other angle, as the novel describes it, she may, however, appear as beautiful. 

Klaus Kinski’s character Boyd also does what Kinski does best. He stands threateningly in the background smiling maliciously while also on occasion helping Wellby out of a conundrum. 

 In the book Boyd is an elderly gentleman with a passion for fly fishing who even gave up a promising career in pursuit of his hobby. 

O.W. Fischer, the film’s lead, is a breath of fresh air for the Krimi genre. 

Austrian actor Fischer was one of the highest paid German language film stars in the 1950s next to Curd Jürgens. Black Widow would become his only classic Krimi and one of his final films. Even though he still occasionally appeared on German television, he effectively decided to retire at the height of his fame. 

His most famous parts were Bavarian King Ludwig II and the infamous clairvoyant Erik Jan Hanussen, two troubled and eccentric real life characters. 

And troubled and eccentric he is also in Black Widow… albeit in a very entertaining way. 

His Wellby is constantly besozzled, slovenly dressed, prone to grandiose gestures and hiding his intelligent reporter’s instincts behind a facade of befuddlement that would make a Columbo proud. Somewhat a coward and clearly not a fighter, if he lands a punch it is by pure luck. He lives on a house boat and at the start of the film is even seen wearing a Van Dyke beard! 

Eddi Arent plays an archivist who helps Welby uncover some crucial information, absolutely incorruptible … unless he is offered the right amount of money for his services. 

Werner Peters is the director of the newspaper, for all appearances on a power trip but in reality way over his head and in deep trouble. He can neither manage Wellby, nor the other members of the expedition nor indeed his wife (played by Doris Kirchner), who quietly sits amongst the group of powerful men and on occasion contributes a wise throwaway remark that always calms the waters. 

Kirchner in real life was married to director Franz Josef Gottlieb and had previously also appeared in his CCC Wallace Der Fluch der gelben Schlange/The Curse of the Yellow Snake (1963). 

It is all those German actors that mainly make this an enjoyable watch. The Spanish actors in comparison aren’t given that much chance to shine. 

The direction itself is workmanlike but not overly exciting. We do get a few interesting camera angles here or there but for the most part the production just plods along. 

Visually the most stunning part is a nightclub scene in which chanteuse Belina sings a song (music by Martin Böttcher, lyrics by Ute Just and F.J. Gottlieb) that perfectly reflects the film’s mystery. That performance is full of mirrored reflections, shadow work and closeups to hypnotically staring eyes. 

All in all, this is one production that - in line with the other three Louis Weinert-Wilton films - may not reach the heights of the Rialto Edgar Wallace series but is enjoyable enough that it is worthy of a proper rediscovery. 

AVAILABILITY 

Coming at no surprise for anyone reading this blog, Black Widow is easily available in Germany on DVD and Blu-ray though not in an English friendly version. 

The German version of the film with English subs can be viewed on YouTube. 

YouTube also has the English dub of the film, albeit in a horrendously looking upload.

Das Geheimnis der schwarzen Witwe/The Secret of the Black Widow (1963, Lobby Cards)

 I am currently in Germany and picked up some lobby cards for Das Geheimnis der schwarzen Witwe/The Secret of the Black Widow, a Louis Weinert-Wilton adaptation from 1963 by Franz Josef Gottlieb and starring O.W. Fischer, Karin Dor, Klaus Kinski, Werner Peters and Eddi Arent.

There are 24 lobby cards in a full set and I now have 13.

Die Gruft mit dem Rätselschloss/The Curse of the Hidden Vault (1964) - Lobby Cards

 Time for some lobby cards again, this time for Die Gruft mit dem Rätselschloss/The Curse of the Hidden Vault (1964).

The Thousand Eyes of Dr. Mabuse (German Film Program)

 Illustrierte Filmbühne 05412

Scan of an eight-page German film program for Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse/The Thousand Eyes of Dr. Mabuse (1960) by Fritz Lang, the first in a series of six Dr. Mabuse movies that I covered in my eBook THE MANY MASKS OF DR MABUSE.

Die weisse Spinne/The White Spider (1963)

When her husband, a gambler, is found killed in a car crash with a white spider as a key ring in his possession (his talisman but also the symbol for one of London's most notorious contract killer gangs) the insurance company refuses to pay for his life insurance and his wife (Karin Dor) is forced to work for her living in a reform society for convicts where she meets Ralph Hubbard (Joachim Fuchsberger) who was recently released from Dartmoor. Scotland Yard strongly suspects the wife of being involved in the killing but also needs to take drastic measures when one leading policeman is found dead as well. They bring in a mysterious Australian crime fighter who prefers to hang on to his anonymity and conducts his interviews hidden from view by a couple of beaming lights. One-eyed men, strange Indians and oh-so altruistic priests all stand in the way of solving the mystery behind the killings that shock London.

Following the success of Germania-Film's Teppich des Grauens/The Carpet of Horror, two small German film companies, Arca-Winston Films and Hans Oppenheimer Film, decided to co-produce another Louis Weinert-Wilton Krimi: Die weisse Spinne/The White Spider based on his debut novel from 1929.

For Arca-Winston this was their debut production that they followed up a year later with another Krimi Das Wirtshaus von Dartmoor/The Inn on Dartmoor before focusing on a dozen pseudo-documentary sex education movies. Hans Oppenheimer Film also didn't exactly set the cinematic world on fire with the couple of productions that they helmed.

Despite its non-distinguished parenthood The White Spider ended up being quite a fun Krimi entry and a step up from The Carpet of Horror. They obviously learned their lesson from looking at Carpet and not only hired its director Harald Reinl and the stars Joachim Fuchsberger (relaxed and likeable as usual), Karin Dor (way too irrationally panicky for my liking) and Werner Peters (in a surprise part playing a cop for a change) but also went a few steps further in Wallacefying the experience.

From the first scene onwards it becomes painfully obvious to the viewer what Carpet had been missing: Peter Thomas' weird jazzy kind of soundtrack, a screenplay written by an Edgar Wallace veteran and also more familiar faces in the supporting roles (as opposed to the Spanish actors that were by and large unfamiliar to the German public).

And The White Spider has all that in spades.

Peter Thomas replaced Francesco De Masi and now again added his typical vibes to the production.

The screenplay was written by a certain Albert Tanner who was none other than Egon Eis who, under the nom de plum Trygve Larsen, had also been the writer of the very first Rialto Wallace, Der Frosch mit der Maske/Fellowship of the Frog and who provided just the right mix of secret doorways, hidden gadgets and men in masks galore for this movie.

And instead of Spanish unknowns we have familiar German faces in even the smallest roles:

Horst Frank surprisingly enough never appeared in a proper Wallace production but was a very familiar villain in many a German movie, the kind of guy who got hired when Kinski wasn't available and here plays a knife wielding ex-convict up to no good. Chris Howland in real life was a wise cracking English radio DJ who had tremendous success in Germany and was Eddi Arent's replacement in some of the Bryan Edgar Wallace movies. Also look out for Dieter Eppler as a lawyer, Friedrich Schoenfelder as Sir James, the head of Scotland Yard, and Mady Rahl as an ex-stripper past her prime who finds a very grisly death.

The movie is fast paced, good fun and just the right thing to watch when you have already gone through all the original Rialto productions. If anything it is actually quite brutal for the time in its on-screen depictions of strangulations courtesy of Reinl who just can't keep his paws off a good piece of rope.

One of the most fun scenes must certainly be when we see Fuchsberger's character interview an old lady who ends up being anything but and involves him in a furious fight sequence.



There are two things, however, that could be listed as The White Spider's main shortcomings.

First of all the budget does not seem to have expanded to a trip to London or to the nearest stock library and as such is missing the all familiar clips of Big Ben, Tower Bridge et al. Instead we have typical German side streets trying hard (and failing badly) to pretend they're Soho and wintry scenes of an icy Hamburg harbour standing in for the Thames.

To make up for this lack of authentic scenery the crew appears to have taken every possible opportunity to plaster pictures of Queen Elizabeth II on every available office wall. Have a whisky for every time you spot a portrait of the Queen in The White Spider and you are bound to reach the end of the film in a comatose state.

Worst of all, however, is the complete and utter lack of proper mystery. If you have found my blog you already know enough about the typical roles played by each actor to know who in truth is the mysterious Australian inspector. And does anyone really trust Werner Peters as a fighter on the side of law and order?

Also, if you read this blog it is proof that you still have your proper eye sight. As such you will not find it remotely difficult to see through all those disguises of the master villain's attempt at being a Man of Half a Dozen Faces (or more to the point: a RINGER replacement).

None of that, however, matters much as the fun that can be had from this Krimi far outweighs weaknesses in the story department. After all, one does not really watch those movies for Nobel Prize winning plots but for a certain sense of mood and intrigue that is available here in bundles.

Again, this production has never been released on DVD but if you venture into Soho's darkest alleys you just may come across some one-eyed men able to locate a copy with English subs provided you swear ever lasting allegiance to the secret society they represent.