The Road to Rio (1931)

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Movie
Original title The way to Rio
Country of production German Empire
original language German
Publishing year 1931
length 82 minutes
Rod
Director Manfred Noa
script Bobby E. Lüthge ,
Margarete M. Langen
production Anatol Potok for the Lothar Stark film, Berlin
music Friedrich Hollaender ,
Artur Guttmann ,
Stefan Rényi
camera Willy Goldberger ,
Akos Farkas
occupation

as well as Gustav Püttjer , Karl Platen , Fritz Greiner and Erwin van Roy : four prisoners

The Way to Rio is a German feature film from 1930 that tells of the dangers of international girl trafficking . It was the last directorial work of Manfred Noa, who died prematurely in December 1930 . The main roles are occupied by Maria Solveg and Oskar Marion as well as Senta Söneland and Oskar Homolka .

The script by Lüthge and Langen is based on a novella by WE Friedrich Nietzsche .

action

The young secretary Inge Weber and the chauffeur Karl Plattke are lovers. One day Karl “borrows” his boss's car for a joke tour through the countryside and lets Inge take the wheel for a moment. A terrible mishap already happens: Inge loses control of the vehicle and accidentally runs over a child. The accident with these terrible consequences caused panic in both young people. They flee from the scene of the event to Hamburg, where they go into hiding in a small hotel. This dump is run by a dubious person, the matchmaker Berta Andersen, who has few scruples. She currently has a visitor from South America, a certain Ricardo Gabiano, an even less scrupulous girl trafficker who is once again looking for “fresh goods” in Hamburg. Since he has to find a replacement for his competitor Felice, whom he recently snatched a girl from under the nose, if he doesn't want to get into a lot of trouble, Inge's presence is just right for him.

Matchmaker Berta, who found out about Karl's escape from a newspaper article, introduces Ricardo to the young woman. Under the pretext of being a rock-solid businessman looking for a talented stenographer, he appears like a saving angel to Inge, who is still very afraid of any arrest. She accepts Gabiano's offer to follow him to Rio de Janeiro. Karl, who doesn't want to let Inge go alone, is lured by Berta by saying that he could follow her a few days later with a forged passport.

Once in the Brazilian metropolis, Inge soon realizes that she has fallen into the hands of a mean girl trafficker. She is put on site in the dubious establishment of a certain Barera and is supposed to secure her livelihood as a pianist there, since, according to Gabianao, allegedly there were difficulties with her employment as a typist. Inge suspects nothing good and wants to flee when she is supposed to go to the tables of the paying establishment guests as a "hostess". Quite alone in a completely foreign city, she would like to find another less disreputable job. But Gabiano gets hold of her, and Inge's steady decline begins. Eventually it reached its lowest point when it was handed over to the “Green Ball” dive bar. There Inge, meanwhile made addicted to morphine by Ricardo, ends up as a “lost soul” and threatens to finally sink into the cheapest prostitution and end up as a hooker.

In the meantime, Karl was told by Berta to the police immediately after Inge's departure. He had to serve a prison sentence for Inge's offenses. With the support of the League to Combat International Girl Trafficking, Karl immediately sets off for Rio to look for his Inge. Initially he doesn't get any further on site, but when he meets Marietta, a friend of Inges in Rio, he can track down his missing friend. Inge had made another attempt to escape shortly before - again in vain - and has now, after Gabiano's abuse, reached a psychological and physical low point. Karl finds her in a pitiful state, because Inge had fiercely defended himself against Ricardo, was used by Ricardo as a harbor hooker and exploited and was overthrown in her resistance. Now finally the police, informed by Karl, arrive and arrest the girl trafficker and his henchmen. But Karl can finally take his Inge in his arms again and bring her home to Germany.

Production notes, publication

The way to Rio was created in October and November 1930 in the UFA studios in Neubabelsberg. Producer Anatol Potok also took over the production management, Walter Rühland took care of the sound. Hans Sohnle and Otto Erdmann designed the film structures. A few years earlier, Bobby E. Lüthge had written the script for The Women's Refuge in Rio , also a film about trafficking in girls.

Co-composer Artur Guttmann also took over the musical direction. The José Llossas Orchestra played with its tango orchestra. The film includes the tango song Come here my boy , music: Friedrich Hollaender , text: Charles Amberg and the choral song Die gute Polizei , music: Stefan Rényi, text: Charles Amberg.

The film was 2257 meters long, spread over eight acts, was censored on January 12, 1931 and was premiered on January 15, 1931 in Berlin's Terra-Lichtspiele Mozart Hall and in the Titania Palace. The film also traded under the further title The Green Ball and in Austria under the distribution title Girls Traders at Work . In Denmark it was published on February 2, 1931 under the title Slavehandleren fra Rio . The international title is Road to Rio .

Almost at the same time, Jaap Speyer shot a topic that was very similar in topic with dancers wanted for South America .

useful information

Films that deal with the topic of international girl trafficking have a long tradition in both Denmark and Germany. During the silent film era, especially in the 1900s and 1910s, but also after the First World War, a number of related cinema productions were made, which enjoyed considerable popularity with the Central European audience.

criticism

In January 1931, the Austrian Film Newspaper spoke of a “dramatically moving, exciting story” and also called The Way to Rio “extremely effective”.

The critic and author Karlheinz Wendtland wrote on the subject of trafficking in girls - “then and still a scourge for women!” “ The Way to Rio ” is a “film that tries to clear up such fates - even if it is perhaps different from a sensational audience understood “. It is true that one occasionally has the “impression that this is being exaggerated”. But you have “only the feeling” that “the reality” is “much worse!” Wendtland went on to say: “The film has excellent actors who seriously take care of the problem raised.” Ickes said in the film week : “The film is well cast: it will be a feast for the eyes for opticians. I mean for moviegoers who, as they say, have learned to see optically. This Homolka, for example, is wonderful, Maria Solveg is utterly a path of suffering, a catastrophe from bottom to top; and Marion and Hertha von Walter: the film is really well done. "

Aftermath

The Centrum für Filmforschung eV Cinegraph Babelsberg wrote the film “in the genre of girl trafficking films, so-called white slavery films, which tell of kidnapped and seduced young girls who are lured abroad with false promises, and finally to the brothels To land in South America or other exotic locations ”. These films are “almost as old as the film itself” and “mostly boom when an international congress to combat trafficking in girls has taken place beforehand”, “such as in Warsaw in 1930”. Noa's film, however, is not just a “speculative crime film that met the tastes of the audience at the time”, but “met with divided opinions in the film press”. The premiere of the film in Brazil also triggered "a wave of national indignation" and "in spring 1931 led to one of the most serious cultural-political disputes between Germany and Brazil".

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Karlheinz Wendtland: Beloved Kintopp. All German feature films from 1929–1945 with numerous artist biographies born in 1931 . Second revised edition 1991, first edition 1989. Publisher Medium Film Karlheinz Wendtland, Berlin. ISBN 3-926945-09-5 , Film 7/1931, p. 11.
  2. ↑ a b Rediscovered 246: “The way to Rio”, D 1931, Manfred Noa sS filmblatt.de
  3. ↑ The way to Rio Fig. Page from the film courier
  4. ^ The way to Rio in the Austrian film newspaper