Hocuspocus (1953 film)

Hocuspocus (Hokuspokus) is a 1953 West German comedy crime film directed by Kurt Hoffmann and starring Curt Goetz, Valerie von Martens (his wife) and Hans Nielsen. Based on Goetz's own play from 1926 and on the first movie of 1930 of which an English-language version was made at the same time, it was remade in 1966 in color as Hocuspocus.

It was shot at Göttingen Studios. The film's sets were designed by the art director's Kurt Herlth and Hermann Warm.

Plot
After the unsuccessful painter Hilmar Kjerulf has supposedly died, interest in his paintings rises significantly. One of his admirers is the President of the criminal court handling the case of his soft-spoken widow Agda Kjerulf. She is accused of having drowned her husband in a lake and simply defends herself by remaining silent or theatrically dropping unconscious. A mysterious person warns the court president several times that somebody wants to kill him on a certain date, and the supposed victim calls for his friend and lawyer, Mr. Graham, to come for support. The mysterious visitor shows up, revealing his identity as Peer Bille, son of a famous circus artist and manager, and demonstrates some evidence pointing to Mr. Graham plotting to kill his friend. Revealing that the evidence he just presented is nothing but "hocuspocus", he urges the court president to take a particularly critical look at the evidence in the current case. The next day in court the President learns, that attorney Peer Bille has taken over the defence of Mrs. Kjerulf because her lawyer has stepped down. Bille and the state attorney try to reconstruct the last day of the late painter. Bille can make some points but confusion rises when witness Kiebutz testifies that Mrs. Kjerulf has received conjugational visit from a man right after the supposed death of Mr. Kjerulf. Eventually Mr. Graham is allowed to investigate and succeeds in proving Peer Bille to be much more than a counsellor for Mrs. Kjerulf. As tides turn against Bille, he and his accomplice reveal the whole plot and the real reason, how and why painter Hilmar Kjerulf died but actually has not died at all.

Cast

 * Curt Goetz as Peer Bille
 * Valerie von Martens as Agda Kjerulf
 * Hans Nielsen as court president
 * Ernst Waldow as prosecutor
 * Erich Ponto as Mr. Arthur Graham
 * Elisabeth Flickenschildt as witness Kiebutz
 * Joachim Teege as witness Eunano
 * Margrit Ensinger
 * Mila Kopp
 * Fritz Rasp as attendant
 * Tilo von Berlepsch
 * Fritz Brandt