Continental Films

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The Continental Films SA , often short- Continental called, was a company established with German capital fitted, in Paris the German occupation years resident (1940-1944) production company, under the leadership of the former UFA -Produktionschefs and film producers ( The man who Sherlock Holmes was ) Alfred Greven and made a total of 31 films, including a number of high-quality productions subsequently by important and talented French directors such as Henri-Georges Clouzot , Christian-Jaque , Henri Decoin and André Cayatte . For a long time, even well after the Second World War , Continental and its boss were seen, even by French cineasts, as a cinematic phantom that was directed by the enemy and, according to the simplistic assumption, received orders from the Nazi leadership in Berlin. Or as the film critic Jacques Siclier erroneously put it in 1981: “ Société française, à capitaux allemands, installée à Paris, ne dépendant de Vichy et placée sous la direction d'un monsieur sans âge, sans visage, sans passé [sic!] , appliquant les ordres de Goebbels: Alfred Greven ”The first Continental film went into production on February 17, 1941 with the crime film Murder on Christmas Eve ; the last Continental film was the Georges Simenon film adaptation of Les Caves du Majestic , which was available for screening in 1944 , but only started in theaters there after the liberation of France.

Company history

Foundation and political goals

Continental Films, like the French offshoot of the German Tobis, AEG-Tobis-Klangfilm, was a film production company under French law with German capital. The order to found a German-controlled film production company in occupied France was given by the German Propaganda and Film Minister Joseph Goebbels in September 1940. The director of this company, who was still active as UFA production manager for a short time in the spring of 1939, was reassigned by Goebbels after only a few weeks Elberfeld's superseded Alfred Greven was appointed, who took up his post on October 1, 1940. "Greven requisitioned Parisian studios and French theaters and in a short time brought the production activities of French competing companies to a virtual standstill." "Officially, Continental-Film is a French production company; de facto, however, the company is managed by the German Cautio-Treuhandgesellschaft. The Cautio is subordinate to the German Propaganda Ministry and thus Minister Goebbels. Greven receives the instructions from the head of the Cautio, Max Winkler . Goebbels wants the Continental to make simple, kitschy films. Alfred Greven sees the whole thing differently. He is passionate about the new company and engages stars like the actors Fernandel , Harry Baur , Edwige Feuillère , Pierre Fresnay , Raimu and Danielle Darrieux . In addition, directors such as Maurice Tourneur , Henri Decoin or Christian-Jaque. ”Only a few directors such as the highly regarded Jean Renoir preferred“ to leave the German-occupied country as quickly as possible after Greven's offer to cooperate, in order to gain the reputation of collaboration escape. "

High phase of production

Well positioned with the French filmmakers willing to cooperate, Greven soon succeeded in producing high-quality films that were recognized even after 1945. In addition to Clouzot's masterpiece The Raven, this also included the above-average criminal case The Murderer Lives No. 21 by the same director and Maurice Tourneur's film fantasy The Devil's Hand . Continental also produced a number of simple comedies and romances from Fernandel and Richard Pottier's hand , which was much more in keeping with Goebbels' intention. Most of these films were shown in German cinemas until the end of the war in 1945. Over the years, the sometimes high quality of Greven's production increasingly contradicted Goebbels' film policy, so that the Continental boss was summoned to the Goebbels Ministry in Berlin in May 1942: “The minister is at the same level as the Continental films dissatisfied: it is too high for him. In addition, Greven is to produce German-language films with German actors in Paris. " As late as May 19, 1942, Goebbels had written in his diary entry that he was angry about Greven's company policy, since it allegedly showed the French how to banish national pride on celluloid instead of serving them with stupid films. German film policy, Goebbels continued, must be “identical” to that of the United States towards North and South America. “We have to become the film power on the European continent”. To the extent that films are produced in other countries, they should retain “a purely local character”. The goal, Goebbels continued, is to “prevent as much as possible” the creation of any national film industry in Germany-occupied Europe.

Greven countered precisely this claim with his Continental company policy. He initiated several ambitious film adaptations of French high literature ( Guy de Maupassant , Émile Zola , Honoré de Balzac ) and “not only employed the screenwriter Charles Spaak , who was arrested by the Gestapo , but also consciously held his protective hand over the one sought by the occupying power Communists, resistance fighters and Jews Jean-Paul Dreyfus, alias Le Chanois , like Spaak scriptwriter (Continental film “ The Devil's Hand ” [42]). ”The assistant director Jean Devaivre , who was a resistance fighter in his second life, was also employed by Continental. With Der Rabe , a gloomy image of a society under constant mistrust and pressure to denounce, Continental-Films reached its artistic production peak in 1943, even if this film was banned immediately after the liberation by the new French government offices and the two main actors, Pierre Fresnay and Ginette Leclerc , for alleged collaboration with the enemy were temporarily banned from working or even punished with six months in prison. “Rabe” director Clouzot was only commissioned to direct again after three years of boycott and was only able to direct his first post-war film in 1947.

The end

For the production year 1944, Greven planned, in order to appease the angry Goebbels in distant Berlin and meet his wishes for more German actors to appear in Continental films, “also to make German films. Greven tries to engage the German-speaking Italian actresses Alida Valli and Vivi Gioi for title roles; this fails. In May 1944 Greven then signed the actors Oskar Sima, Wolf Albach-Retty and Inge Egger. But there is no longer any production. ”The end of the Continental Films came as suddenly as it was total. After the Americans, British and “free French” landed in Normandy in June 1944, the Franco-German film company ceased its work completely after three and three quarters of years. Two months later (August 1944) the Allies entered Paris and liberated the French capital. At this point in time, Continental boss Greven had long been back in the Reich.

In 2001, Bertrand Tavernier directed the French film Laissez-passer (in German: “Passierschein”), which retells the work of French filmmakers under the Continental umbrella in just under three hours. Company boss Greven was embodied here by Christian Berkel .

Continental productions (complete)

  • 1941: Murder on Christmas Eve (L'Assassinat du père Noël) by Christian-Jaque
  • 1941: You were six (Le Dernier des six) by Georges Lacombe
  • 1941: Your first rendezvous (Premier rendez-vous) by Henri Decoin
  • 1941: The golden butterfly (Le Club des soupirants) by Maurice Gleize
  • 1941: Children before marriage (Péchés de jeunesse) by Maurice Tourneur
  • 1941: Ne bougez plus by Pierre Caron
  • 1941: Once a year (Caprices) by Léo Joannon
  • 1941: Paris sur Seine (short documentary)
  • 1941: Mademoiselle Bonaparte (Mam'zelle Bonaparte) by Maurice Tourneur
  • 1941: Annette and the blonde lady (Annette et la dame blonde) by Jean Dréville
  • 1941: Symphonie der Liebe (La Symphonie fantastique) by Christian-Jaque
  • 1941: The Eerie House (Les Inconnus dans la maison) by Henri Decoin
  • 1942: Love in the South (Simplet) by Fernandel
  • 1942: Mariage d'amour by Henri Decoin
  • 1942: The false mistress (La Fausse Maîtresse) by André Cayatte
  • 1942: The murderer lives in No. 21 (L'assassin habite au 21) by Henri-Georges Clouzot
  • 1942: Défense d'aimer
  • 1942: The Devil's Hand (La Main du diable) by Maurice Tourneur
  • 1942: Picpus
  • 1943: Vingt-cinq ans de bonheur by René Jayet
  • 1943: Paradise of the Ladies (Au Bonheur des Dames) by André Cayatte
  • 1943: Adrien von Fernandel
  • 1943: The Raven (Le Corbeau) by Henri-Georges Clouzot
  • 1943: Mon amour est près de toi by Richard Pottier
  • 1943: Le Val d'enfer by Maurice Tourneur
  • 1943: La Ferme aux loups by Richard Pottier
  • 1943: Sons of a mother (Pierre et Jean) by André Cayatte
  • 1943: La Vie de plaisir by Albert Valentin
  • 1943: Le Dernier Sou by André Cayatte
  • 1943: His most difficult case (Cécile est morte) by Maurice Tourneur
  • 1944: Les Caves du Majestic by Richard Pottier

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Jacques Siclier: La France de Pétain et son cinéma . Henri Veyrier, p. 42, Paris 1981, ISBN 2-85199-229-5 .
  2. ^ Translation: "French company with German capital, based in Paris, not dependent on Vichy and run by a gentleman without age, without a face, without a past, executing the orders of Goebbels: Alfred Greven."
  3. ↑ a b c d The forgotten films
  4. ↑ a b Kay Less : The large personal dictionary of films , Volume 2, p. 392. Berlin 2001
  5. ↑ Kay Less: Between the stage and the barracks , p. 24. Berlin 2008 ISBN 978-3-938690-10-9

literature

  • Francis Courtade: La Continental ; in Heike Hurst and Heiner Gassen (eds.): Tendres ennemis. Cent ans de cinéma entre la France et l'Allemagne , L'Harmattan, 1991, pp. 217-236
  • Georges Sturm: UFrAnce 1940-1944. Collaboration and film production in France in Hans-Michael Bock and Michael Töteberg (eds.): The Ufa book . Zweiausendeins, Frankfurt am Main 1992, pp. 408-414; The films of Continental, p. 415 (filmography).
  • Jean-Louis Ivani: Continental Films, l'incroyable Hollywood nazie , Lemieux éditeur, 2017
  • Christine Leteux: Continental Films - Cinéma français sous contrôle allemand , La Tour Verte, 2017

Web links