European Cinemas in Context
Germany (1)
From the beginnings to the 3rd Reich
Dr Gert Vonhoff
Film and Cinema in Wilhelmine Germany
The Birth of German Cinema
1 Nov 1895 - Max Skladanowsky,
Bioscope (double projection)
1st screening of 15 minutes
1896-97 Berlin Alexanderplatz
Oskar Messters – inventor Maltese cross
Oct 1897 sales catalogue listed 84
films, visual reports (optische
Berichterstattung)
from 1910 Messter Woche, the first
Wochenschau
From Cinema of Attractions to Industries
variety theatres
travelling shows focus on films
from 1905: stationary cinemas
(shop cinemas, rented films)
1905 – 40, 1906 – 200,
1908 – 1000, 1912 – 3000
1913 Marmorhaus in Berlin opened
1909-1913/14 rise of a national film
industries
Gottschalk 1910: Monopolfilm
PAGU (1909) – Projektions AG ‚Union‘
DECLA (1915) – Deutsche Eclair Film und
Kinematographen GmbH
UFA (1917) – Universum Film AG
Consolidation years 1914-1920
During WWI German companies expanded,
Ludendorff founded the BUFA in 1917, escapism is
the demand of the day
1911-1914: longer narrative film emerged
(film drama), multi-reelers
new techniques in camerawork, editing, mise-enscene
film-specific language
birthplace of genre, star system (Paul Wegener, Albert
Bassermann, Asta Nielsen, Henny Porten), and directors
(Ernst Lubitsch, Max Mack, Joe May, Franz Hofer)
Fantastic Genre: The Student of Prague (1913), The
Golem (1915), Homunculus (1916-17) as Gothic style
German Cinema
research since 1990s sees continuation of pre-war
traditions
What does Expressionist Film Mean?
Covers the period from 1919-1924/27: expressionist film (German prewar arts) / films of New Objectivity (American influence) – best term is
‘Weimar film’ and ‘Weimar cinema of the silent era’
after German consolidation in 1870s Expressionist Art
expressed resistance against and opposition to static forms
of official art in the Kaiserreich
counter movement to French Impressionist Art which was felt
not be enough of opposition
express the unrest and demand of change in Wilhelmine
Germany
Die Bruecke in Dresden & Der Blaue Reiter in Munich
What does Expressionist Film Mean? (2)
Expressionism in pre-war decades
vitalistic, at times slightly naïve
blow up paralysed self-images of bygone era
use of bright vibrant colours vs monochrome
movement vs static
abstraction in form and colour vs realism
human emotion, sexuality vs etiquette
misunderstanding of WWI as liberation from paralysis
machine driven war in the trenches as wake-up call
this and political change after war-end (Empire turned
Republic) makes it obvious that there is an end of 1st
phase of expressionism: change into more analytical
modes of painting and illustration (influence of
Sigmund Freud and the new psychoanalysis)
What does Expressionist Film Mean? (3)
Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr Caligari
(1919/20)
DECLA production
starred Werner Krauss as Dr Caligari and
Conrad Veidt as the somnambulist Cesare
sets the standards for the expressionist style in film
extensive use of mise-en-scene
sharp black and white contrasts
(chiaroscuro lighting)
strict regime on the geometry
painted sets reduce a naturalistic setting to an
artificial space of two dimensional lines
(following Max Reinhardt’s theatre)
actor motion develops from a still: jerky, sloweddown dance-like movements
revealing the inner world of the characters and
their state of alienation
The Cabinet of Dr Caligari
Cinematic devices
editing kept simple
shot – reverse shot, crosscutting
slower pace
functional camera-work
oblique camera angles
false perspectives
All this stresses the disintegration of the
individual, loneliness, isolation, alienation:
disillusioned analysis of life in a modern
capitalist society
other topics:
effect of authoritarian structures, misuse
of power and science
The Cabinet of Dr Caligari (cont.)
Original script of the film by Hans Janowitz and
Carl Meyer
Kracauer reads this as a revolutionary
story
Erich Pommer accepted the script
Robert Wiene suggested essential modification
invention of the framing story
Kracauer: while the original exposed the
madness inherent in authority, Wiene’s Caligari
seems to glorify authority and convicted its
antagonist of madness – a revolutionary film
seems to be turned into a conformist one
But is Kracauer right?
The Cabinet of Dr Caligari (cont.)
Ending of the film – within the mental asylum
uses similar camera-angles, actor
movements, lighting effects as the rest
film much more continues to produce
vagueness
more than one possible reading as a
technique used in avant-garde art of
the 1920s
Weimar Cinema
To fully understand Weimar Cinema one has to look at its precarious
position between art, politics and entertainment.
put it into context of the wider debate on culture within the
capitalist society of Weimar Germany
general atmosphere of lost orientation, insecurity and unease in
the 1st phase of the Republic (1919-1924)
Weimar Cinema, 1st phase
Entanglement of the new media in rules of mass-production and markets
script-writers, artists, actors, directors more often on the avantgarde half of the cinematic world
producers, distributors, film companies on the capitalist side
1919-1923
increase in German film productions due to low costs
Caligari helped selling German films abroad
UFA in Babelsberg competitors of Hollywood
sophisticated sets, lavish costume, star system (UFA stars)
UFA as merger of industry, banks and state (at 1st military forces)
Fridericus Rex, 1920-23 in 4 parts
example of conservative influence brought
along by joint ventures
Otto Gebuehr as star
Mountain films as popular genre
Weimar Republic (2nd and 3rd phase)
Inflation peaked in 1923, introduction of new
currency stabilized markets – 5 years of
prosperity, stability and wealth from 1924-1929:
The Golden Twenties
1929 stock market crashed and marked the
beginning of a deep and long economic crisis.
With Dawes Plan (in 1924) – America became rawmodel
New Objectivity style, modernity, ideology
of the machine age
new image of the woman: Flapper
the Angestellten as new social class
Hollywood influence in film making
Influence of Alfred Hugenberg (Deutschnationale
Volkspartei)
Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927)
310 days and 60 nights of filming
total costs of 2,000,000 dollars
750 actors in supporting roles
36,000 walk-on parts
refined sets and latest technology
monumental film set new standards: the
most significant utopian film of the silent
era
but lack of contents:
the satirical magazine Simpl brought caricatures,
the captions of which read:
‘Simple newsreel for film directors. Take ten tons of
horror, pour into it a tenth sentimentality, boil it with
some kind of social attitude, season it with mythicism
according to taste, stir it well with Deutsch-Mark
(seven million of it) and you’ll get a marvellous epic
movie.’
Metropolis: Ufa Aethetics and cliches
Fascination and fears of the modern technology –
ultra modern opening of the film
depiction of faceless mass of workers – sets social
quality of the analysis – left wing positions
Maria and the film deals with her – sentimental
simplifications takes shape: love story with
Freder: the heart as intermediary between the
brain and the hands = philanthropic 18th idea
evil located in relentless and fanatic Rotwang, a
Jewish scientist who creates robots – right wing
a typical UFA production, as it has:
‘a strong capital base, squandered carelessly, a talent for largescale organization and a tendency to go astray in microscopic
details; devotion to artistic excellence and to its perversion,
which was empty perfectionism; a delight in the imaginative use
of technology and in its reverse, which was mere technical
slickness; a quest for philosophical power, but pursued in an
intellectual vacuum; a ‘will to form’ that produced an amorphous
ruin; craftsmanship, imagination, and diligence, and the waste of
all those virtues through intellectual arrogance and the lack of a
governing concept.‘ (Kreimeier, 1999, The UFA story, pp.151f.)
Film as product of the culture industries
Frankfurt School since late 1920s: analysis of the
culture industries
works through instrumentality: instrumental
reason represents the negation of the substantive rationality of the Enlightenment
Walter Benjamin’s essay ‘The Work of Art in the
Age of Mechanical Reproduction’ (1936)
loss of the aura for works of art because of
mere technique of industrial reproduction
instrumentality opens art up for misuse
analysis of Fascism: efforts to render politics aesthetic
Late Weimar Years and 3rd Reich
After Black Friday, 1929, economic crisis
unemployment and social unrest exploited
by the parties of the right, rise of NSDAP
German Film remains successful despite decreasing audiences, industries by far the strongest
in Europe
Introduction of sound creates
new formats and genres (musicals, comedy)
new stars (Marika Roekk, Willy Fritsch,
Heinz Ruehmann, Hans Albers)
multi-language versions
NAZI Germany
continued light entertainment cinema
growing concentration of film business
Goebbels as Reichspropagandaminister
1937 Reich bought 70% of UFA stocks
1942 film industries fully nationalized
rise of propaganda film, Leni Riefenstahl
Propaganda film: The Triumph of the Will
Formally experimental, but ideologically narrowed to
Nazi ideology
filmic representation of the 1934 NSDAP rally in Nuremberg, released in 1935
35 cameramen, technical workforce of 170, 120km of film
masterpiece of style and editing
lending of movement to static images
use of contrasting light and dark
use of symbols as controlling images
depicting people as architecture
moving camera, intercuts with close-ups
use of music
film’s opening
borrowing from popular mountain films, but from
plane adds different modern perspective
blending conservative ideology with the utmost
frontier of technological progress
blending mythology and politics
masses as the foundation but meaningless basis for the
Nazi movement