Atlantis (1913)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Movie
German title Atlantis
Original title Atlantis
Country of production Denmark
original language Danish
Publishing year 1913
length 113 minutes
Rod
Director August Blom
script Karl Ludwig Schröder
Axel Garde based
on Gerhart Hauptmann 's novel of the same name from 1912
production Ole Olsen for Nordisk-Film , Copenhagen
music Alexander Schirmann (music from 1913), Robert Israel (music from 1998)
camera Johan Ankerstjerne
Louis Larsen
occupation

as well as numerous other actors in small roles, including Mihály Kertész and Lau Lauritzen senior .

Atlantis is a Danish silent film from 1913 by August Blom based on the novel of the same name by Gerhart Hauptmann . Olaf Fønss can be seen in the leading role in the country's first large-scale production with eight acts .

action

Dr. Friedrich von Kammacher is a well-known bacteriologist . One day he learns that his wife Angèle, with whom he has three young children, is suffering from a hereditary mental illness that makes her susceptible to increasing psychological disorders. For example, she cuts up fabrics in a completely confused manner and then sneaks through the house with scissors, apparently with the intention of stabbing her husband with them. For a long time he endured her changes with a heavy heart without really being able to help the nervous sufferers, but now he himself is soon at the end of his nerves. On the advice of his friend Dr. Georg Rasmussen has Angèle admitted to a special clinic and follows his parents' advice to go to Berlin. There he wants to gain a little distance from the events of the past and refuel mentally and physically. In the German capital, Kammacher meets the dancer Ingigerd Hahlstrøm during a matinee. Her seductive dance “The Sacrifice of the Spider” did not fail to have an effect on the academic: From then on, Kammacher is completely under Ingigerd's spell. But the renowned scientist is not the only man who hangs on the lips of the fascinating artist, and so von Kammacher finally gives up his efforts to gain her favor - for the time being. To make matters worse, a scientific treatise he submitted was rejected. Kammacher decides to leave Berlin and goes to Paris. There he reads in a newspaper article that Ingigerd intends to travel to New York on the SS Roland passenger steamer . Dr. von Kammacher decides to follow her and also buys a ticket for the upcoming passage. In a telegram to Rasmussen, he asks him to look after the children while he is away.

The crossing will be a disaster in every respect. First Kammacher has to find out that his beloved, who is traveling very decadently with her house monkey and a white cockatoo, already has a steady companion who is also on board. There are also plenty of men swarming around her on board. And she enjoys it. On board Kammacher receives a telegram in which his mother informs him that his friend Dr. Rasmussen died surprisingly. An allegedly ill Russian emigrant who is brought to Kammacher's cabin for treatment only seems to be having a fuss with him, and then Ingigerd Kammacher suddenly calls him over - allegedly because she is seasick. After complimenting her father and boyfriend out of the cabin, she suddenly begins to joke with him. Halfway through a fog bank, there is a serious collision with a shipwreck. The Roland is badly leaked, the water flows in and the ship begins to sink. Attempts are made in dramatic succession to get all the passengers in their nightgowns running across the deck planks like chickens on fire into the lifeboats. Panic arises among people.

Ingigerd can no longer get her cabin door open and then suffers a fit of weakness. Kammacher enters the cabin from outside and carries her to a lifeboat. Then he climbs up to her. As once on the Titanic, not all passengers can be brought into the lifeboats and thus saved. Von Kammacher also has to watch the other unfortunate people sink into the sea with the ship or trample helplessly in the water. Of all lifeboats, only the one with Friedrich von Kammacher and Ingigerd on board is the one that is supposed to survive the sinking of the Roland . Only a handful of people survive the ship disaster. Kammacher had a premonition of the events, after all, at the moment of the ship collision, he had dreamed of the fabulous realm of Atlantis, which had also sunk. When Ingigerd learns that both her father and her lover have also drowned, she is devastated. The next day the castaways are picked up by a passing cargo ship, the 'Hjortholm', and after four more days they are safely brought to New York.

Still traumatized by the shipwreck, Ingigerd no longer feels able to continue working artistically and gives up her job as a dancer, which was always her calling. But she still loves to be courted and ensnared by strange men - much to the misfortune of Kammacher, who, as before, is jealous. Friedrich has to recognize that his love for Ingigerd has no future and turns away from her. The doctor began to be interested in art in New York and met his likeable student Miss Burns in the studio of the sculptor Ritter. Both develop closeness to each other. In order to finally relax, Kammacher accepts the offer of a friend, his colleague Dr. Schmidt, to pitch his tent temporarily in his hut in the wilderness. In fact, Friedrich was able to gain some distance from the events of the past weeks and months that had troubled him. Dr. Schmidt visits him there one day. He has a telegram with him from home. It says that Kammacher's wife, Angèle, died. The widower then falls seriously ill. Now it is the sculptor who turns out to be a true friend. Miss Burns moves in with him and takes loving care of Friedrich in the snow-covered winter hut until he is fully recovered. From these moments of deep trust arises intimacy and ultimately love. Miss Burns promises to be a good mother to his orphaned children. As a couple, they both return home to Europe.

Backgrounds, production notes and interesting facts

Atlantis was filmed from July 18 to September 26, 1913. The first demonstration (for those interested) took place on November 27, 1913 in Düsseldorf . The official premiere was on December 18, 1913 in the Berliner Kammer-Lichtspiele on Tauentzienstrasse. In Denmark, the country of manufacture, the film ran on December 26, 1913 at Paladsteatret in Copenhagen.

At around half a million crowns production costs - of which 80,000 crowns only for the sinking of the ship - Atlantis was considered the most expensive film of its time and at the same time the first monumental production in Scandinavia. The playing time of almost two hours was also unusually long for this time.

Since Atlantis had an abundance of filming locations at home and abroad (including in the streets of Berlin but also in Dragør, Amager, Klampenborg (Denmark), Finse (Norway) and New York City) and numerous scenes were to be created at the same time, the producer committed Nordisk-Film assisted by the Danish Robert Dinesen and the Hungarian Mihály Kertész . The latter, who 30 years later would achieve world fame in Hollywood as director Michael Curtiz with Casablanca , also made a brief appearance in front of the camera with Kammacher's college friend Hans Füllenberg.

Like Deniz Göktürk in her essay Atlantis or Vom Sinken der Kultur. The ennoblement of early cinema in auteur films on page 73 citing contemporary newspaper sources, around 80 leading actors, around 100 supporting actors and around 500 extras were hired for the ship scenes. In addition, an ocean liner (the CF Tietgen of the Danish shipping company DFDS ), three overseas cargo ships, two tugboats, numerous motorboats and a wreck that was rebuilt at considerable expense were used. Göktürk called the film “a cinema event of decisive cultural importance”.

The production was already considered to be so complex and enormous during the shooting that at a time when there was hardly any coverage of the cinematography, which was previously considered disreputable, even serious newspapers wrote. In the Wiener Neuigkeits-Welt-Blatt in the edition of September 11, 1913 on pages 21 and 22 under the heading "The most expensive cinematographic recording" there was a large article about the shooting:

“The most expensive film is likely to be the recording that a Danish film company is currently working on. It concerns the production of pictures from Gerhart Hauptmann's novella Atlantis , in which the sinking of an ocean liner is described with all horrors. The story of the sinking of the steamer Roland is illustrated in a gripping way cinematographically. No less than five hundred people show life on board an ocean liner. You see them dining, dancing and flirting until misfortune falls. Then the cinematograph describes the terrible scenes that take place among those passengers who are startled from their sleep. One is transported into the middle of the terrible reality, because nothing is missing to convince us of the truth of the living image. It is believed that the surgeon witnessed such an accident and that he succeeded in capturing these scenes photographically. You forget that there is no one who, in the face of death, would have such nervous nerves to take calm photos. The last recordings will be made in autumn. between the sinking ship and the castaways floating in the water fighting the waves. For this purpose, a copy of a steamer was made from wood, which was brought to sink. The participants are consistently good swimmers and are protected from incidents by swimming belts and numerous lifeboats. The production of this film devours a huge fortune and will probably be the most expensive that has ever been put on. "

There were also preliminary reports in other publications; for example in the First International Film Newspaper of September 6, 1913 or in the US American The Motion Picture News in the editions of August 30, September 6, and September 27, 1913. The film ran well in German cinemas into the First World War ; There were advertisements or reviews about Atlantis in Der Kinematograph , No. 423, of February 3, 1915, in the Vossische Zeitung of June 19, 1917 and in the Briesetalbote of September 20, 1917.

Atlantis stands for the attempt to raise the quality of cinematography with the auteur film, which up to this time was hardly regarded as a simple fairground amusement, and thus to meet a gradually emancipating public taste. In 1913, ambitious literary adaptations were made in various Central European countries: in Denmark, in addition to Atlantis , an adaptation of Arthur Schnitzler's Liebelei (under the title Elskovsleg ) was made, and in Germany the literary works The Other and The Student of Prague were launched . In Austria-Hungary, the theater star Alexander Girardi played a selection of his greatest theatrical successes in his country's first large-scale production, The Millionaire Uncle .

Despite the enormous effort, Atlantis was all in all a losing business. In Germany, the country of Gerhart Hauptmann, the film ran exceptionally well, in other countries rather poorly.

In 1993 a restored laser disc version was released by Atlantis , and in 2005 the film was released on DVD.

Hauptmann and the Atlantis film adaptation

Template author Gerhart Hauptmann, photograph by Nicola Perscheid (1914)

Hauptmann himself only gave sparse comments on the film. His diary entry from January 14, 1914 has been handed down. There it says: “The Atlantis film. What a miracle. Could I have guessed it when I made the trip on the 'Elbe'? " For the film rights, the author received 20,000 RM plus royalties of at least 4% to a maximum of 10%. The assumption that Atlantis could have been inspired by the Titanic disaster the year before, however, is wrong. Hauptmann published his novel shortly before the British luxury liner went down. However, after In Nacht und Eis , Atlantis is another film from the early days that has a shipwreck as a staging highlight.

The cast of the seductive nanny Ingigerd by the Austro-Russian Mimin Ida Orloff met Hauptmann's wish, as she, like Hauptmann, was part of the autobiographical parts of Atlantis . Hauptmann had seen the then 16-year-old in 1905 at the Lessing Theater in Berlin as a nanny Hannele (in his Hanneles Himmelfahrt ) and was instantly deeply fascinated by her. Since his work And Pippa is dancing! Ida Orloff appears again and again in literary terms in Gerhart Hauptmann's oeuvre.

Reviews

Despite fundamental controversies about sui generis literary adaptations, the film was perceived as a major cinematic event in 1913 and was often enthusiastically received.

In Germany, for example, the Neue Hamburger Zeitung read : "As a technical-cinematographic masterpiece, this sequence of scenes is just as worth seeing as it is as a great modern sensation."

Vienna's Neue Freie Presse was no less full of praise. In the edition of December 19, 1913, it says on page 21: “A highly talented director detached from Hauptmann's work with a sure eye everything that is dramatic and effective on the cinema stage and can be woven into picturesque situations and has it again knew how to unite into a whole. A scenic apparatus was set in motion, which is astonishing by the magnificence of the technical aids and the financial means that it required. [...] The giant steamer Roland sinks into the water. In these scenes the film reaches its climax, which is at the same time a climax of dramatic and technical cinema art in general. "

However, there were also critical comments regarding the discrepancy between film directorial and artistic demands. Julius Hart wrote: The film is “a prime example of how little the great contradictions and differences between cinematographic and poetic representation are brought into play” and concluded: “... give art what art, the cinematographer what the cinematograph is. "

Also in the mouthpiece of the cinema reform movement from the time before the First World War , Bild & Film , different assessments of the purely cinematic and artistic achievements of Blom come to light. There it says that the film was very successful “from a technical point of view” and that “the well-calculated photographic effect” was emphasized, but the “soul” of the film was missing: “The dramatic structure of the whole thing is plump, confused and thoroughly amateurish . The individual play of the main characters is also shamefully mediocre, even that by Ida Orloff from the Hofburgtheater Vienna. The light stage and the cinema drama of the future really demand more than the film factories and the gentlemen and ladies of the speech stage suspect. [...] So the bottom line is: for the actual art of film, for the cinema drama, Atlantis means a complete fiasco . The whole thing is tailored for gross sensation, for the great shiver that is supposed to be chased over the audience by the ship disaster. "

Hermann Häfker , who is considered particularly critical , left little good in Blom's ambitious staging, which indeed contained “edible things”, but nevertheless proves that “mental processes” cannot be portrayed on screen.

From the modern point of view, the restrained and sometimes clumsy staging and the wooden depiction of the main actors leave numerous questions unanswered. Deniz Göktürk writes in her analysis:

“Why was there so little of the pleasure and threat of female eroticism in the film? Compared to seduction scenarios in other contemporary films, such as the social dramas with Asta Nielsen, whose body language was far more explicit, the great passions in ATLANTIS are less than convincing. The male lead actor Olaf Fønss as Friedrich von Kammacher - also selected by Gerhart Hauptmann - made a wooden impression with his theatrical depiction of affect. The theater actress Ida Orloff stood in front of the camera for the first time. But that alone cannot have been the reason for the lack of eroticism and grace. Ida Orloff, too, could possibly have been more seductive under a different direction and in a different costume. The seduction scenario that was laid out in the material was not played out in the film adaptation. Rather, everything that is disreputable seems to be deliberately withdrawn in the production of ATLANTIS, as the film sought to approximate a prevailing standard of high culture and to lure an educated audience into the cinema. The uneasiness in the sphere of trivial entertainment that dominated the novel was expressed in the film by the indecisive staging of the dancer. "

- Deniz Göktürk: Atlantis or On the Sink of Culture . : The ennoblement of early cinema in auteur films. Munich 1994. p. 77 f.

The Dane Carl Nørrestedt wrote in his essay Copenhagen - Berlin - Copenhagen: Olaf Fønss (1882–1949) : “This film full of Weltschmerz was tailored to the taste of the German audience. His dream visions hardly seemed stylized and had nothing in common with 'expressionist' stylistic devices. The symbols from Hauptmann's novel were only implemented with difficulty and looked more like foreign bodies in the course of the plot. "

literature

  • Deniz Göktürk : Atlantis or On the Sink of Culture. The ennoblement of early cinema in auteur films. In: Manfred Behn (Red.): Black dream and white slave. German-Danish film relations 1910–1930 (= A CineGraph book ). Edition Text + Critique, Munich 1994, ISBN 3-88377-483-9 , pp. 73–86.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Robert Dinesen and Mihály Kertész assisted him .
  2. ↑ Other sources incorrectly name the 20th
  3. ↑ "Atlantis". In:  Neuigkeits-Welt-Blatt , September 11, 1913, p. 21 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / nwb
  4. ↑ Cf. Deniz Göktürk: Atlantis or From the sinking of culture. In: Manfred Behn (Red.): Black dream and white slave. 1994, pp. 73-86, here p. 85.
  5. ↑ Cf. Heinz-Bernd Heller: Literary Intelligence and Film. On the change in aesthetic theory and practice under the impression of the film 1910–1930 in Germany (= media in research + teaching. Series A, vol. 15). Niemeyer, Tübingen 1985, ISBN 3-484-34015-0 , pp. 80-98.
  6. ↑ Cf. Deniz Göktürk: Atlantis or From the sinking of culture. In: Manfred Behn (Red.): Black dream and white slave. 1994, pp. 73-86, here p. 81.
  7. ↑ Cf. Deniz Göktürk: Atlantis or From the sinking of culture. In: Manfred Behn (Red.): Black dream and white slave. 1994, pp. 73-86, here pp. 76, 85.
  8. ↑ Deniz Göktürk: Atlantis or From the sinking of culture. In: Manfred Behn (Red.): Black dream and white slave. 1994, pp. 73-86, here p. 75.
  9. ↑ Deniz Göktürk: Atlantis or From the sinking of culture. In: Manfred Behn (Red.): Black dream and white slave. 1994, pp. 73-86, here p. 85.
  10. ↑ "Atlantis". In:  Neue Freie Presse , December 19, 1913, p. 21 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / nfp
  11. ↑ Hart: The Atlantis Movie. In: The day. No. 301, dated December 24, 1913.
  12. ↑ LH: "Atlantis". In: Image & Film. 3rd volume, issue 6, 1913/14, ZDB -ID 619116-2 , pp. 137-139 .
  13. ↑ Hermann Häfker: "Atlantis". In: Kunstwart and Kulturwart. 27. Vol., Issue 11, March 1914, ISSN  0932-2051 , pp. 400-402 .
  14. ↑ Published in: Carl Nørrestedt: Copenhagen - Berlin - Copenhagen: Olaf Fønss (1882–1949). In: Manfred Behn (Red.): Black dream and white slave. German-Danish film relations 1910–1930 (= A CineGraph book ). Edition Text and Criticism, Munich 1994, ISBN 3-88377-483-9 , pp. 116–124, here p. 118.