G. W. Pabst directed the 1929 German silent film commonly known in English as Pandora’s Box.
The film is a landmark of Weimar-era cinema and stars American actress Louise Brooks as Lulu. Pabst adapted the story from Frank Wedekind’s stage dramas Earth Spirit and Pandora’s Box, reshaping the material into a visually distinctive film about desire, social judgment, and Lulu’s destructive relationships.
Although the movie is widely called Pandora’s Box in English, its original German title is Die Büchse der Pandora. It was made during the silent-film period, shortly before sound cinema transformed international filmmaking.
Pabst is often discussed alongside Fritz Lang and F. W. Murnau as a major German director of the era, but neither directed this film. The movie’s reputation grew substantially during later revivals, especially because of Brooks’s performance and screen presence.