Plot summary

The film is set in a French colony in Africa. Saint-Avit is a young French officer who recounts the story of his adventure in the sunken city of Atlantis.

In Atlantis, the beautiful Antinea rules her city. Saint-Avil and his friend Morhange were taken there. Antinea has a reputation for making every man hopelessly infatuated with her, and this is also true for Saint-Avil. Only Morhange refuses to be bewitched by her beauty and remains steadfast. This angers the ruler, and she convinces Saint-Avil to kill his friend. Saint-Avil is utterly distraught after the deed.

Antinea becomes his enemy, but his revenge is unsuccessful. Only with the last of his strength does he manage to escape Atlantis and avoid being murdered by Antinea.

His tale rekindles his passion and devotion to Antinea. He sets off for Atlantis once more but disappears in a sandstorm in the desert and is never seen again.

Plot notes

Although the plot of this version of L'Atlantide follows the novel and the 1921 film, Pabst and his screenplay writers Ladislaus Vadja and Hermann Oberländer [de] took a different approach to several points in the film. While Benoît's novel was written in a literal and linear way, Pabst took creative liberties. One notable point is that in this version, the film begins with Saint-Avit having a flashback activated by a broadcast on the radio that discusses the possibility of Atlantis being located in the Sahara. As it ends, Saint-Avit speaks to a fellow soldier, confirming the broadcaster's hypothesis and commences telling his story. The structure of narration from this point is framed entirely as a flashback from Saint-Avit, who may be suffering from hallucinations caused by desert heat, or by his compulsion to smoke hashish. Because of this, viewers may be unsure whether or not Saint-Avit can be trusted as a narrator.^[3]