German horror mystery movie from 1920.

A variation of the famous Oscar Wilde tale in which Dorian Gray's soul is manifested in a painting instead of his own body.

In this early version the classic "Hound of the Baskervilles" mystery is not faithfully adapted, Watson's character is absent and there are two Holmes. Holmes' foe is called Stapleton and he menaces Holmes' client Lord Henry and his fiancée, Laura Lyons, masquerading himself as Holmes. Hidden passages, hand bombs and mechanical devices abound, reminding more of a serial than of a Conan Doyle story.

This movie, directed by Richard Oswald, is based on the operetta "Les contes de Hoffmann" by Jacques Offenbach (1819-1880), which is a genial musical potpourri from various short stories and novels by the Prussian writer, composer, painter, lawyer and judge E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776-1822). While Hoffmann's literary work was longtime considered to be merely fantastical, it was finally researched, in the last years, according to its metaphysical background. Characteristic for Hoffmann's work is his life-long fight against rationalism and for the revelation of nature morte, culminating mostly in carnival-like scenes anticipating literary techniques only described in the works of Bachtin and Bachelard.

Guy Walser killed the unscrupulous seducer of his sister Marguerite and had to spend several years as a Bagnos convict for this bloody deed . His past is like a brand on his social existence that he can never shake off. He married Lucienne and they had a lovely daughter, Lilly. Despite all the wealth that Guy has worked for, he remains an outcast who, as the title suggests, seeks nothing more than eternal peace for himself.