August Kern

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August Kern-Geyer (1902–1996) Director, producer, screenwriter, cameraman, film distributor, chemist, grave at the Hörnli cemetery, Riehen, Basel-Stadt
Grave in the Hörnli cemetery , Riehen, Basel-Stadt

August Kern (born March 2, 1902 in Laufen ; † January 15, 1996 in Basel ) was a Swiss director, producer, screenwriter, cameraman, film distributor and chemist. His scientific and didactic documentaries were the most successful. Kern is one of the pioneers of the early sound film era in Switzerland. His cinematic estate is in the Swiss Film Archive .

Life

His parents were the landlord and forester August Gustav Kern and Pauline Josephine , née Burger . After graduating from the Realgymnasium Bern , Kern studied chemistry at the Technikum Burgdorf .

He gained his first cinematic experience in 1919 in the Pro Vorarlberg Committee . After completing his studies, he did an internship at the young Eagle Film Enterprise of his future brother-in-law Milton Ray Hartmann (1898–1977), the majority of which was sold to the experienced American film producer and distributor Charles Urban . In 1921, Kern and Hartmann founded the Swiss School and People's Cinema (SSVK, French: Cinéma scolaire et populaire suisse ) in Bern to introduce the population to the medium of film. Due to the profile and level of the films that might today be classified as docutainment, there was also criticism of this film distributor. Until 1932, Kern held various functions (including head of film production from 1925). Most of the approximately 50 productions were destroyed in a fire.

1922-23 he was a delegate of the SRC in southern Russia. This resulted in the 1923 award-winning film The Secrets of the Kalmyk Steppe, which was awarded a year later . From the life of the Tatars and Kalmyks - the first ethnographic Swiss film. In 1929 he married his first wife, Maria Steinegger , who had a fatal accident while filming after five years of marriage. When the Genossenschaft Filmdienst Bern (GEFI) was founded in 1931, which produced state-financed feature films, Kern took over the management as secretary.

In 1932, Kern produced the first Swiss sound mountain film with the high-mountain drama Goldfieber , which was better known under the title The Golden Glacier / The Herrgottsgrenadiere . Thematically, it is based on the early western films - even before the epoch-making Sutter's Gold by James Cruze and its various adaptations. At the beginning of the 1930s , there was a fruitful collaboration with the young German director Anton Kutter from the bankrupt Emelka . For these films, Kern not only hired Gustav Diessl as the main actor, but also the composer Peter Kreuder for the film music. As a result of an avalanche accident in which not only his wife died, filming of The White Devils was stopped in 1935. In 1937/38, but also long after the end of the Second World War, he made a series of films for the Swiss Traffic Center .

In 1938, Kern ended his collaboration with Bavaria Film AG in Munich because of the Nazi influence from Berlin and turned entirely to home. The subject matter of Gilberte Montavon , which Bolo Maeglin had brought to the stage as a folk piece, resulted in a suitable script in the sense of spiritual national defense ; 's Margritli und d' Soldate ran parallel to Franz Schnyder's Gilberte de Courgenay - despite their not exactly high artistic standards, both became popular with the public. Because of Kern's earlier contacts in Nazi Germany, there was not only a suspicion of espionage against him, but also a forced cooperation with the Swiss Ministry of Defense and an export ban for the film When the Cuckoo Calls . In 1945, Kern entered into a second marriage with Maria Gruyer .

Kern-Film AG was founded in Basel in 1948, and he remained its managing director until 1977. One of the production company's first cameramen was Andreas Demmer . In 1951, August Kern and the director of Radio Basel initiated the first Swiss television station with private participation. In 1964, Kern made a film about baboons with the Swiss primatologist and behavioral scientist Hans Kummer (1930–2013).

After his death on January 15, 1996, an obituary appeared in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung .

Works (selection)

  • 1923: The secrets of the Kalmuck steppe (French: Les mystères de la steppe kalmouk. La vie des Tartars et des Kalmouks / Les peuples des steppes russes ); Camera and direction
  • 1932: Gold Fever / The Golden Glacier / The Herrgottsgrenadiers ( Grenadiers du bon dieu ); Script and production
  • 1933/34: The white majesty ( Un de la montagne , with Hertha Thiele and Rolf Pinegger ); Production and direction
  • 1934/35: The white devils ( Les diables blancs , with Olga Chekhova and Armin Schweizer ); Script and direction
  • 1935: Zyt ischt Gält (commercial, with Heinrich Gretler ); Director
  • 1938: Alpenföhn ; Production (with Walter Leckebusch ) and direction
  • 1940/41: 's Margritli und d' Soldate - Serious and cheerful things from the border occupation ( Marguerite et les soldats , with Robert Trösch and Gilberte de Courgenay ); Director
  • 1941: When the cuckoo calls ( Al canto del cucù , with Ettore Cella ); Production and direction
  • 1958: St. Gotthard. Middle between north and south ( Le Saint-Gothard. Train d'union entre le Nord et le Sud ); Production and direction
    • The Apple Watch ( La merveilleuse Horloge du Roi Pomme ); Production and direction
  • 1962: tailor-made holidays! ( Vacances sur mesure! / Vacanze su misura! / Vacaciones a la medida! / Away From It All! ); Production and direction
  • 1966: Secret Life. Becoming - growing - passing on / miracle of reproduction ( Le secret de la vie ); Production and direction
  • 1974: Life from the Tree / Fruit ; Director

Awards

In 1924 The Secrets of the Kalmyk Steppe was awarded an international film prize in Berlin. The 1966 film Secret Life even won several awards. In 1988, Kern received the Basellandschaftliche Filmpreis and the Kunstpreis der Stadt Basel .

The Milton-Ray-Hartmann-Stiftung produced a film portrait of August Kern.

Fonts

  • To the Swiss documentary film . In: Kunstgewerbemuseum Zurich (ed.): The film. History, technology, design elements, meaning . Catalog for the exhibition of the same name. Zurich, 1960 (pp. 176–179)

literature

  • Hervé Dumont : History of Swiss Film . Lausanne 1987
  • Yvonne Zimmermann: Mountain Guide Lorenz . Career of a failed film. Schüren, 2005. ISBN 978-3-894-72511-2
  • Past and present of Swiss film (1896 to 1987) : a critical assessment. Swiss Film Center, 1987
  • Werner Wider, Felix Aeppli: The Swiss Film 1929-1964 . Presentation. Limmat Verlag 1981. ISBN 978-3-857-91034-0
  • Franz Burgert: The Song of Courgenay: the true story of origin; the most miraculous song fate , Schüpfheim: Das Entlebucher Medienhaus, [2016], ISBN 978-3-906832-02-9

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Anita Gertiser: Domestication of the moving image . From documentary film to teaching medium , PDF
  2. ↑ Christopher Frayling : Spaghetti Westerns . Cowboys and Europeans from Karl May to Sergio Leone. IBTauris, 2006. ISBN 978-1-845-11207-3 (p. 29)
  3. ↑ Thomas Meyer: Moments for the Ear: Music in Old Swiss Films . Facets of a little noticed art. Kommissionsverlag Hug, 1999 (p. 29)
  4. ↑ Montage / av: Journal for Theory & History of Audiovisual Communication , Volume 15, Issues 1–2. B. Hartmann, 2006 (p. 105 f.)
  5. ↑ Hans Amstutz, Ursula Käser-Leisibach, Martin Stern : Swiss Theater . Drama and stage in German-speaking Switzerland up to Frisch and Dürrenmatt 1930–1950. Chronos, 2000. ISBN 978-3-905-31345-1 (p. 290 ff.)
  6. ^ André Amsler: Flashback: from black and white film to digital video . Fifty years of production technology. Chronos, 2004. ISBN 978-3-034-00689-7 (p. 26)
  7. ↑ Hans Kummer: In Quest of the Sacred Baboon . A Scientist's Journey. Princeton University Press, 1997. ISBN 978-0-691-04838-3 (pp. 83 ff.)
  8. ↑ Jürg Schneider: Well versed in all professions . On the death of the Swiss film pioneer August Kern NZZ, January 19, 1996, p. 45 (free full access only for NZZ subscribers)
  9. ↑ Jürg Frischknecht , Thomas Kramer , Werner Schweizer : Film landscape: Engadin, Bergell, Puschlav, Münstertal . Verlag Bündner Monatsblatt, 2003. (p. 81)
  10. ^ Antonio Petrucci : Twenty Years of Cinema in Venice . Edizioni dell'Ateneo, 1952 (p. 517)
  11. ↑ Basler Stadtbuch 1988 , Volume 109. 1989 (p. 308 f.)
  12. ↑ to find all works under Kern's participation, the function in the second search mask must be changed accordingly (director / production / credits)
personal data
SURNAME Kern, August
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss producer and director
DATE OF BIRTH March 2, 1902
PLACE OF BIRTH Running BL
DATE OF DEATH January 15, 1996
Place of death Basel