M

M (M — Eine Stadt sucht einen Mörder, 1931) is Fritz Lang's crime thriller, and you can watch it online on iFILM. A killer is hunting children, and a whole city tears itself apart trying to stop him.

The police flood the streets with raids and checkpoints, yet the man slips through every net. All those raids wreck business for the underworld, so thieves, beggars and gang bosses set out to catch the murderer themselves. Peter Lorre plays Hans Beckert, a soft, ordinary-looking man who whistles a tune from Grieg's Peer Gynt before he approaches a child. Two manhunts run side by side now, one led by the law and one by criminals, and it is anyone's guess who reaches him first.

This was Lang's first sound film, and he turns sound into evidence: a whistle gives the killer away where no eye can. The basement trial, where crooks demand his blood, is still pulled apart in film classes. The picture sits among the peaks of German Expressionism, and the role of Beckert made Lorre a star. Stream M (1931) online on iFILM.