The Strange Case of Captain Ramper

The Strange Case of Captain Ramper (German: Ramper, der Tiermensch) is a 1927 German silent film directed by Max Reichmann and starring Paul Wegener and Mary Johnson. It was produced by Defu Company of Berlin, an American production unit associated with First National Pictures, Inc. The rights to the film were acquired by First National Pictures in 1928 for copyright and distribution.

The Strange Case of Captain Ramper
Directed by	Max Reichmann
Screenplay by	Curt Johannes Braun Paul Wegener[1]
Based on	Ramper by Max Mohr
Starring	Paul Wegener Mary Johnson
Cinematography	Friedrich Weinmann Herbert Körner[2]
Music by	Walter Ulfig[2]
Production company	Deutsche Film-Union AG[2]
Release date	31 October 1927 (1927-10-31) (Berlin)
Country	Germany[2]
Language	Silent

Plot

Captain Ramper (Paul Wegener) and his loyal mechanic Charles Ipling (Camillo Kossuth) set out on a daring flight to conquer the North Pole. Their aircraft is last seen over the furthest outposts of civilization before vanishing without a trace.

The pair crash-land in the frozen wilds of northern Greenland, their plane shattered and unusable. There, they discover the abandoned depot of an earlier expedition — a frozen relic of failure and hope. Sustained by its remaining provisions, the two men endure brutal winters. But time stretches on, and hope fades. Ipling succumbs to the harsh life; Ramper, shattered by isolation and grief, loses his mind. He becomes a creature of the Arctic, living like a beast among polar bears — howling, scavenging, forgotten.

Years later, a whaling ship, locked in Arctic ice and captained by The Captain (Raimondo van Riel), captures a strange man-like creature. They bring him back to Europe, where he is sold to a fairground showman. This man is Ramper — no longer recognized as the famed aviator, but displayed like a sideshow beast.

Only one person can approach him without fear: Zizi (Mary Johnson), the gentle sister of the booth-owner. Ramper, drawn to her with a deep and primal tenderness, obeys her every gesture. But Chocolat (Kurt Gerron), her devoted lover, is growing uneasy about the strange connection between them.

At the fairgrounds, psychiatrist Dr. Barbazin (Hermann Vallentin), accompanied by his assistant Doktor (Hugo Döblin), visits out of curiosity. To his shock, he recognizes the “animal” as the long-lost Captain Ramper. Barbazin takes Ramper to his sanatorium, determined to awaken the human mind dormant beneath the savage mask. Slowly, miraculously, he succeeds.

Yet Ramper, though healed in mind, finds himself spiritually alienated. The modern world — with its machines, its noise, its greed — horrifies him. He sees clearly now the dehumanizing pace of progress. He cannot understand or accept it. Even Zizi, the one soft light in this new life, cannot love him — her heart belongs to Chocolat.

When a charity fund is raised to support his rehabilitation, Ramper instead gives it to Zizi and Chocolat, selflessly supporting their future together. He has no place in this world. Longing for the only peace he’s ever known — the frozen solitude of the North — he signs aboard a whaling ship as a simple seaman. Ironically, it is the same vessel that once brought him out of the wilderness.

As the ship vanishes again into the white silence of the polar sea, Captain Ramper returns to the only life that made sense to him — far from men, back among the ice and the bears.^[3]

Cast

Cast adapted from Michael Pitt's book Thrills Untapped and Filmportal.de.^[2]

• Paul Wegener as Kapitän Ramper
• Camillo Kossuth as Charles Ipling
• Kurt Gerron as Chocolat
• Mary Johnson as Tony
• Hugo Döblin as Doktor
• Georg Guertler as Freddy
• Max Schreck as The Thin One^[1]
• Hermann Vallentin as Barbazin
• Raimondo van Riel as The Captain^[1]

Production

The Strange Case of Captain Ramper was based on the play Ramper play by Max Mohr.^[1] The film's sets were designed by the art director Leopold Blonder.^[2]

Release

The Strange Case of Captain Ramper was released in Berlin on October 31, 1927.^[2]

It was released in the United States by First National in 1928. On the film's American release, it was re-edited, adding brief spoken prologues about a dirigible castrophe as the lead in to the film's plot.^[1]

The film was believed to be lost, with only some visual material showcasing it, but the full 50 minute version under the original title "Ramper, der Tiermensch" has been uploaded to Youtube and is Public Domain due to its age.^[1]

Reception

From contemporary reviews, a reviewer in Variety found the film "somewhat better than the Contemporary German pictures seen on this side during the last season or two" but that it was also "draggy" concluding that the film was "fair to middling screen fare" and suggested it needed more editing.^[4] Photoplay described it simply as a "German picture with original plot. Just a bit heavy."^[4]