Heart of Stone (1950 film)

Lore & Background

The film follows Peter Munk, a charcoal burner in the Black Forest who is treated with disdain due to his lowly craft. Stung by ridicule, he desires to marry the beautiful Lisbeth, but sees his only chance for prosperity in appealing to the good forest spirit Glasmännlein. Peter wishes for dancing ability and money, but his foolish wishes lead to debt and the loss of his glassworks. Desperate, he turns to the dark spirit Holländermichel, who replaces Peter's heart with a stone in exchange for wealth. Peter becomes ruthlessly successful but loses all feeling, eventually killing his wife Lisbeth in a fit of anger. The Glasmännlein helps him trick Holländermichel to retrieve his heart, and Peter's last wish undoes his misdeeds, restoring his old life.

Reader's Guide

Heart of Stone is one of the most successful DEFA pictures of all time, selling 9,779,526 tickets at its start in 1950. It was originally intended to be directed by Erich Engel but was given to Paul Verhoeven, who filmed it in spring and summer of 1950 primarily at Babelsberg Studio, with additional shots in the Lauchagrund valley near Tabarz and around Schwarzburg, as the Black Forest belonged to West Germany. The production cost 3.2 million marks, significantly exceeding its budget, and involved a crew of well over fifty people. As the first East German color film (Agfacolor), it marked a technical milestone for DEFA and remains a notable entry in the studio's fairy tale film tradition.

Did You Know?

• Heart of Stone was the first East German film made in Agfacolor.
• The fairy tale was originally published as a story-within-the-story of Das Wirtshaus im Spessart by Wilhelm Hauff in 1827.

A Pioneering Color Production in Divided Germany

The 1950 release of Das kalte Herz marked a technical first for East German cinema: it was the nation's inaugural Agfacolor feature. Director Paul Verhoeven helmed the project after Erich Engel, originally attached, stepped aside. Principal photography ran through the spring and summer of 1950, centered on the historic Babelsberg Studio facilities. Because the story is set in the Black Forest—a region that fell under West German jurisdiction—DEFA could not shoot on location there. Instead, the production team turned to the Lauchagrund valley near Tabarz and the surrounding Schwarzburg area for exterior sequences. A crew numbering well over fifty collaborated on the shoot. The final production cost of 3.2 million marks significantly outstripped the original budget, reflecting the expense of pioneering color work in the young East German studio system. The film also holds the distinction of being DEFA's first fairy-tale adaptation to employ real, speaking actors rather than animated or puppet figures.

Roots in Hauff's Nineteenth-Century Fairy Tale

The narrative of Heart of Stone traces back to a story first published in 1827 by Wilhelm Hauff, embedded as a tale-within-a-tale inside his novel Das Wirtshaus im Spessart. The fairy tale subsequently appeared as the most celebrated entry in Hauff's Märchenalmanach auf das Jahr 1828, a collection of short fantastical narratives. Hauff's original centers on Peter Munk, a charcoal burner scorned by his wealthier neighbors, who seeks fortune through the aid of a small forest spirit called the Glasmännlein. The spirit, dwelling two hours' walk from any settlement, grants three wishes to anyone born on a Sunday. Peter's ill-advised wishes for dancing skill and endless money set him on a path of excess. When he exhausts his fortune, he turns to a darker spirit, the Holländermichel, who offers wealth in exchange for his living heart, replacing it with a cold stone. The tale's moral architecture—greed corrupting the soul, and the possibility of redemption through a final act of will—gave Verhoeven's adaptation a rich thematic foundation to work from.

A Story of Greed, Loss, and Redemption

At its core, the film follows Peter Munk's descent from a humble Black Forest charcoal burner into a ruthless, heartless tycoon, and his eventual return to humanity. After the Glasmännlein grants his wishes for dancing prowess and a pocket always matching the wealth of the gambler Ezechiel, Peter squanders his fortune in the village inn. When his glassworks faces auction, he makes a desperate bargain with the giant Holländermichel: his heart for inexhaustible riches. The spirit reveals that the village's other wealthy residents have already made the same trade, displaying their living hearts on a wall as grim proof. Peter's stone heart strips him of compassion; he abandons his destitute mother, drives beggars from his door, and in a rage kills his wife Lisbeth for sharing a glass of wine with a stranger who was actually the Glasmännlein in disguise. Only when the small spirit confronts him and devises a trick to reclaim his heart does Peter feel the full weight of his sins. His final wish undoes everything, and he walks hand in hand with Lisbeth toward a restored life.

Box-Office Triumph and Lasting Cultural Footprint

Premiering on 8 December 1950, Heart of Stone went on to become one of the most commercially successful DEFA productions in the studio's history. At its initial release, the film sold 9,779,526 tickets, a figure that underscored the enormous appetite among East German audiences for a visually striking, color-lit fairy-tale spectacle. The combination of Agfacolor's warm palette, the lush forest locations around Schwarzburg, and the moral clarity of Hauff's story clearly resonated with viewers in the immediate postwar period. As the first DEFA fairy-tale film to feature live-action performers, it set a template for the studio's subsequent genre output. The production's overage in costs—3.2 million marks against a tighter budget—was evidently justified by the returns it generated. For a young East German film industry still establishing its identity in the shadow of the divided nation, the film's success represented both a commercial validation and a cultural statement that DEFA could produce work of genuine popular appeal.

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