| The Devil Strikes at Night | |
| Director: | Robert Siodmak |
| Producer: | Robert Siodmak Walter Traut Claus Hardt |
| Music: | Siegfried Franz |
| Cinematography: | Georg Krause |
| Editing: | Walter Boos |
| Studio: | Divina Film |
| Distributor: | Gloria Film |
| Runtime: | 105 minutes |
| Country: | West Germany |
| Language: | German |
The Devil Strikes at Night (German: '''Nachts, wenn der Teufel kam''') is a 1957 West German crime thriller film directed by Robert Siodmak and starring Claus Holm, Mario Adorf and Hannes Messemer.[1] [2] [3] The film noir is based on the true story of Bruno Lüdke. It was shot at the Baldham Studios. The film's sets were designed by the art directors Gottfried Will and Rolf Zehetbauer. Location shooting took place in Berlin and Munich.It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film,[4] as well as winning German Film Award for Best Fiction Film in its native country.
The film is a highly fictionalized account of the hunt for a serial killer, as he murders women during the last year or two of World War II. In one of the crimes, a man is arrested who is obviously innocent. An investigator begins to unravel a thread leading to the real killer, but becomes frustrated by Nazi authorities who believe that revealing the truth will undermine people's faith in their supposedly infallible system. The detective story gradually evolves into a narrative about the evils of political propaganda and corruption.