User Reviews

This lavish production about a stolen painting was made in 1945 at Prague's Barandov Studios. Hans Steinhoff directs and Hans Albers plus an enormous supporting cast star in it. The story of the movie is somewhat bizarre, and seems even more confusing since the movie never had been completed. The shooting was put on hold, when the Russians marched into Prague in April 1945. The completed material finally ended up in Berlin, where it was locked away in the archives of the East German DEFA, unseen for almost 5 decades. In 1993 Michaela Kruetzen, author of an astonishing Hans Albers biography, sighted the old " Shiva..." - material and combined it it with newly filmed scenes (also shot in Prague), starring Manfred Zapatka in the Albers role. Between the scenes old newsreel material, as well as interviews with surviving cast and crew members were added. This film documentary is extremely well done, and historically very interesting.

This movie was never finished. The production was stopped in april 1945 when the Russian army entered Prague, where the film was shot. Only 2/3 of the movie were finished at this time.The director Hans Steinhoff was killed in a plane crash on the 20 april 1945. There only exists a reconstruction of the film with new material. The scenes which were not available were new filmed with new actors and combined with documentary footage about the time of the production of the film. This version was made in 1993 and has a running time of 80 minutes.