The country without women
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The country without women |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1929 |
| length | approx. 117 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Carmine gallon |
| script |
Ladislaus Vajda based on the novel The Bride No. 68 by Peter Bolt |
| production |
Hermann Fellner Josef Somló Arnold Pressburger |
| music | Wolfgang Zeller |
| camera |
Otto Kanturek Bruno Timm |
| cut | Hans Oser (sound editor) |
| occupation | |
| |
The country without women is a German feature film from 1929 from the transition from silent to sound films. Directed by Carmine Gallone played Elga Brink and Conrad Veidt the leading roles.
action
The country without women, that is Australia in the 19th century. The country, which was being built up by the British colonial rulers, is largely still uninhabited and poorly developed, is suffering from an acute shortage of women willing to marry. For this reason, the British government in distant London is issuing a call for girls and young women with a thirst for adventure to come forward. A total of 413 women come together who are immediately sent by ship to the fifth continent. Also in the gold digger camp Coolgardie, where numerous soldiers of fortune literally toil to death in search of the find of their lives, the women are eagerly awaited. In order not to start a huge scramble between the men for the "best" women, a girl was previously assigned to each man by drawing lots.
But one of the girls dies during the several weeks crossing of the “Hastings” from England to Australia. Now one of the longingly awaiting, gold-digging rough legs must inevitably remain solo, and so the ship's officers decide to help fate a little. Out of boredom and arrogance, the gentlemen on board are holding another raffle. This leads to the fact that the New Australian, for whom the deceased was intended, now receives a new girl, namely bride no. 68. Since this means that the man for whom bride no. 68 was intended continues to be unmarried there is a lot of anger in the air. The person cheated on his wife is the telegraph officer Dick Ashton, who works in Perth, Western Australia . He is by no means ready to simply do without his future.
While "his" girl, Evelyne Narnheim, marries the gold digger Steve Parker, anger and jealousy boils in Dick after he has found out about the raffle on board. With a lousy trick that resembles failure to provide assistance, Dick elegantly tries to get rid of Steve. Ashton simply does not pass on a telegraphic call for help from Steve who gets caught in a sandstorm , hoping that this way Mother Nature will do her dirty work for Dick's good. Soon, however, Dick Ashton is so burdened by his own deed, which cost an innocent man his life, that he no longer wants to live. He throws himself in front of an approaching train.
Production notes
The country without women was made from April 1929 as a silent film (see below) in the UFA studios in Berlin-Tempelhof and in the DLS studios in Staaken . The premiere of the film was on September 30, 1929 in the Berlin Capitol, on November 7, 1929 the film had its Austrian premiere in Vienna.
Arnold Pressburger and Hermann Fellner were also production managers. The buildings were created by Hans Sohnle and Otto Erdmann . The later revue film specialist Géza von Cziffra served as assistant director. The music Wolfgang Zeller was recorded under whose direction the Tobis orchestra. This was the last film appearance for Grete Berger .
Awards
The first censorship awarded the film drama Das Land ohne Frauen on August 27, 1929, as a silent film, with the rating “artistic”. The film received the same award on October 11, 1929 as a sound film.
Silent film or sound film
Depending on the source and point of view, this production is referred to as a still-silent film or an already-sound film. The following can be read in Gerhard Lamprecht's German Silent Films 1927 to 1931 : “The film, which was initially shot in silence, was dubbed with music. The most important scenes of the game were recorded synchronously with speech and song, so that it could be premiered as a sound film. Sound system: Tobis, sound: Karl Brodmerkel, Max Brink. "
Reviews
“At first, Tobis doesn't seem to have learned one thing from the fiasco of Ruttmann's Melodie der Welt : that music that, because it is reproduced mechanically, also flirts with the mechanical tone of voice, is stylized impotence. Wolfgang Zeller's ghostly, consumptive tin flutes involuntarily speak to the lively orchestra again. (...) It is understandable that only a few dialogues were inserted. They wanted to explore the possibilities of the genre. But these speaking scenes are inserted incorrectly here. The word is only allowed to throw itself into the montage out of the highest tension ... The film will remain the art of taciturnity. This will be his great strength in an era when the word is being hounded to death from the theater. (...) The delirium of a 'ghost' Oswald, which Conrad Veidt has to perform here, is venerable old theater. "
“The events should take place in the real and brutal reality of a gold rush town. The actors have to play strictly realistic. Conrd Veidt, however, in the main role of the telegraph operator, acts wildly against the content and milieu of the play and also against the representation of the other players. He turns his character into a descendant, 'Caligaris', a fantastic fairy tale character ... You haven't seen an exaggerated mine game in films for many years. That one can express infinitely more with economical gestures is shown above all by Elga Brink in the Gish role of 'Bride No. 68', McLaglen and Mathias Wieman. "
“It's a good, silent film, it's optically attractive lines. The sound film technology is still 'spoken' here in inserts. The women on the ship sing, the men in the bar, in the train: they are melodramatic oases. (...) Gradually the actors also begin to speak. One can already see here that noises (temporarily?) Have more suggestive power. Words disappointed. Not only because the technology still proved to be inadequate here, but also because the words were spoken too meaningfully, too solemnly, too solemnly. In terms of content, however, they were mostly banal. (...) The ending is excellent again, composed like a real finale. "
“In view of this downright embarrassing inadequacy in picture and sound, it is extremely difficult to remain serious. One even defends oneself with hands and feet against ... seeing a discordant croak in the sound film as it was shown to us. Hence the statement in advance that it was not the idea of the sound film that was compromised by the catastrophic inadequacy of the former Ullstein novel Land without Women , but only the capitalist film manufacturers themselves, who believed in their naive greed for profit, only spread it through the popularity of one of Ullstein's Cuddly to get the capital invested in costly sound film experiments out again ... "
Karlheinz Wendtland was of the opinion that the film was "dramaturgically not awkward, but always seemed torn apart by the sound film inserts". Essentially, the film is "supported by the broadcast of Conrad Veidt".
Web links
- The country without women at filmportal.de
- The country without women in the Internet Movie Database (English)
Individual evidence
- ^ Gerhard Lamprecht: German Silent Films 1927–1931 . Deutsche Kinemathek e. V., Berlin, p. 572 f.
- ^ Karlheinz Wendtland: Beloved Kintopp. All German feature films from 1929–1945 with numerous artist biographies born in 1929 and 1930, Verlag Medium Film Karlheinz Wendtland, Berlin, first edition 1988, second revised edition 1990, p. 10, film N4 / 1929. ISBN 3-926945-10-9