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this beautiful gothic fantasy was inspired by a childhood dream of its writer / director fritz lang, who first gained world recognition with the film's triumph.
in a middle-european village a century or more ago, death takes a young man just before he is to be married. his lover seeks out the death figure in a room filled with thousands of burning candles, eachrepresenting a human life. filled with pity for her, he promises to return her fiancé if she can save even one of three lives about to flicker out.
lang then shows the stories of the three lights, in which the lovers of the framing story play the principal parts. in exotic persia, renaissance venice and a fantastic imaginary china she tries her best, but each time the young man is killed and his candle flickers out. finally death agrees to exchange the boy for any person who gives their life for his, but at the end of the film the girl chooses to die too, and death unites the lovers in eternity.
otherworldly atmosphere is created by extraordinary, bizarre sets, gothic lighting and eccentric characters combined with spectacle and camera trickery astonishing for its time, as when a magician makes the chinese emperor a present of a living army of tiny soldiers. with its many magical and haunting images, destiny still possesses real power to impress the imagination. said another great director, luis bunuel, "fritz lang's destiny opened my eyes to the poetic expressiveness of the cinema." its world success established the omnibus form as a method for presenting short horror tales and influenced films as diverse as waxworks, thief of bagdad, dead of night and tales from the crypt.
Rudolf Klein-Rogge