The devil is going on in St. Pauli
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | The devil is going on in St. Pauli |
| Original title | I magliari |
| Country of production | Italy France |
| original language |
Italian German |
| Publishing year | 1959 |
| length | 92 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 18 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Francesco Rosi |
| script | Francesco Rosi Suso Cecchi d'Amico Giuseppe Patroni Griffi |
| production | Franco Cristaldi |
| music | Piero Piccioni |
| camera | Gianni Di Venanzo |
| cut | Mario Seradrei |
| occupation | |
| |
The devil is going on in St. Pauli is an Italian-French social drama set in Hamburg by Francesco Rosi in 1959 with Belinda Lee , Alberto Sordi and Renato Salvatori in the leading roles.
action
Northern Germany, late 1950s. Like many Italians from the poor regions of the country, the Tuscan Mario Balducci followed the call and drove to the economic miracle of West Germany , which promised work and a small prosperity . But it's not going well. He is unemployed and lives in a barrack with a group of Italians. Mario is plagued by homesickness. One evening when he was not served in an Italian restaurant in Hanover, a compatriot from Rome sitting next door invited him to the table of a group of Italians. These look much more well-groomed than Mario and can obviously afford to visit restaurants more often. They belong to a Neapolitan peddler group, the so-called "Magliari", the Germans sell their carpets and various cloths and fabrics for too expensive money. The big word at the table is Magliaro Ferdinando Magliulo, that same Roman, known by everyone as “Totonno”. When a plainclothes police officer shows up and tries to check the passports of the Italians, Totonno uses a trick to steal Mario's passport so that he cannot identify himself and ends up in German police custody. There is a small uproar that calls on the group's “godfather” - Don Raffaele Tramontana - who is sitting next door: He doesn't want any trouble. So the next day, Totonno, ruefully, drops Mario off in front of the Italian consulate with the offer to help the young man who first wants to hit his throat and then bursts into tears.
Mario should also ring the doorbell and sell goods to the German housewives. In contrast to the born salesman Totonno, who can chat his customers into a coma, the rather calm and withdrawn Mario is not exactly a gifted salesman. When Totonno wanted to expand the business to Hamburg, because he knew the German carpet wholesaler Paul Mayer there, and because of this, Don Raffaele turned some of his people off, he took over. Because in Hamburg there are Polish gypsies who do not tolerate competition in their territory and who like to puncture the car tires.
One day, through wholesaler Mayer, Mario meets Paula Mayer, the young wife of Totonno's Hamburg business partner. He falls in love with this cat-like, sensual-beautiful blonde. Totonno expects Mario to immediately pump her up for money so that they can get the gypsies under control. But Mario doesn't want to drag the beautiful woman into the dirty business of the Magliari. Paula also has a dark secret; once she went to the streets, from which she was first taken away by her much older husband. Mario has to learn that even in the young, prosperous Federal Republic of Germany, not all that glitters is gold. In the end, everyone's illusions fell apart: Totonno, with his dream of independence and a trading network throughout northern Germany, had to go to Don Raffaele for help. He remorsefully wants to return to the godfather, but he has long since made a deal with Mayer for a good future cooperation and lets Totonno fall. Mario's love for Paula is not enough either: she doesn't just want to exchange her previous life in luxury and prosperity for a modest existence because of the love for an Italian worker. Faced with these broken dreams, Mario decides to return to Italy to look for an ordinary, decent job.
Production notes
The devil is going on in St. Pauli , original title I magliari (in German, for example: The cloth merchants), was created in late spring 1959 in Hamburg with mainly Italian actors. The premiere took place on September 23, 1959, the German premiere took place over a year and a half later, on April 14, 1961.
From the German side, only Josef Dahmen and Else Knott were there. The Italians spoke Italian (approx. 90% of the film) and the Germans German (approx. 10%), so that the foreign language always had to be subtitled for unsynchronized versions.
The film structures were designed by F.-Dieter Bartels , the costumes by Graziella Urbinati. Piero Piccioni conducted his own film composition.
The British exporter Belinda Lee then stayed in Germany and played the leading roles in two Federal Republican B-films until the beginning of 1960.
Francesco Rosi remembered the filming decades later in an interview:
“ I Magliari was actually my very first real film, because it was the first time I wrote the script. My two previous films were commissioned work. That I made the film was also a coincidence: it was financed. (...) What interested me in the subject is simply to say: The guest worker milieu in Germany. At that time, their life abroad was also an issue for Italy, many families, especially in the south, had some kind of relative who worked in the factories in Northern Europe. Anyone who understands Italian will notice that the main characters all speak in the Neapolitan dialect. I wanted to tell about these Neapolitans, who led a rather lost life there, and also about their proximity to crime, about how difficult it is to escape the milieu of petty crimes in such a life. That's what I wanted to tell you about, and the film also has normal, exciting topics: It's about gangsters and there's a great love story. (...) I remember the film and Hamburg well. Even a good ten years after the war, it was a beautiful city with its gigantic harbor. I have always been particularly drawn to port cities. After all, I was born in Naples, maybe it's because a lot of my films are set in port cities. And Hamburg reminded me of Naples in its spirit back then. It was a lively atmosphere there, full of joie de vivre. "
Awards
- In 1960, head cameraman Gianni di Venanzo received the Silver Ribbon of the Association of Italian Film Journalists .
- Also in 1960, director Rosi received a special mention at the San Sebastián Film Festival
Reviews
“Contrary to expectations, behind this stenciled title you get to see a very decent film by the Italian Francesco Rosi. He describes the dark doings and hustle and bustle of Neapolitan "fabric dealers" between Hanover and Hamburg. For the German viewer, this is done without gross stylistic errors, with an astonishing degree of psychological nuances and with some very nice shots from the port of Hamburg. Belinda Lee plays the cat-eyed wife of the German boss who falls in love with the pure fool Renato Salvatori, but finally lets him go home to his own world. Alberto Sordi in a very good study. "
In Films 1959/61 the following can be read: “A social piece and a moral image in one, the film lacks the style that alone could make it debatable. He arouses interest on the edge due to his milieu analysis. On the whole, however: not a helpful contribution to understanding time. "
In the lexicon of the international film it says: “Francesco Rosi, committed chronicler of the political and social post-war history of Italy, describes the gap between town and country, between rich north and poor south on the basis of the fate of an emigrant, with sociologically interesting pictures from the economic miracle Germany success. The film develops its critical potency primarily from the precise observation of everyday reality. "
Bucher's encyclopedia of the film summed up: "... an unusual story about the criminal exploitation of Italian guest workers in Hamburg ..."
In Kay Weniger's Das Großes Personenlexikon des Films , Rosi's biography reads the following: “After Rosi made one of the first foreign worker films in Hamburg (the melodramatic but not uninteresting story“ The devil is going on St. Pauli ”) with a strong local color and semi-documentary sharpness He caused an international sensation with his Sicilian political, police and judicial thriller "Who shot Salvatore G.?" ... "
Individual evidence
- ↑ Rosi interview on artechock.de
- ^ Films 1959/61. Handbook VI of the Catholic film criticism. P. 17
- ↑ The devil is loose on St. Pauli. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed November 10, 2015 .
- ↑ Bucher's Encyclopedia of Films, Verlag CJ Bucher, Lucerne and Frankfurt / M. 1977, p. 661.
- ↑ Kay Less : The film's great personal dictionary . The actors, directors, cameramen, producers, composers, screenwriters, film architects, outfitters, costume designers, editors, sound engineers, make-up artists and special effects designers of the 20th century. Volume 6: N - R. Mary Nolan - Meg Ryan. Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-89602-340-3 , p. 634.
Web links
- St. Pauli the hell is going on in the Internet Movie Database (English)