The field-gray groschen
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The field-gray groschen |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1917 |
| length | 25 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Georg Jacoby |
| script | Hans Brennert |
| production | Paul Davidson for PAGU |
| camera | Frederik Fuglsang |
| occupation | |
| |
The field gray groschen is a short, German silent film drama from 1917. It served as a promotional film for the sixth war loan in the German Reich.
action
The story begins with the production of four hundred-mark banknotes by means of a state printing press, of which the one with the number E 7400001 is the focus of the ongoing story. The grief-stricken mother Froehlich receives a hundred-mark note with the number E 7400001 for her watch at the gold collection point. The old woman takes it to the bank, where there is a dense crowd because of the war bonds to be drawn and mother Froehlich meets Lieutenant Hochstedt and his bride. There she has this much too large bill exchanged for five 20-mark bills. She asks her neighbor, the friendly tram conductor Ms. Lehmann, at her place of work to receive the corresponding sum in groschen for one of the 20-mark bills. At home she packs the groschen in a package and sends it to the field post office 356 to her son Max Froehlich, a country storm man who is on duty at the front.
In the poor shelter with the meaningful name "Villa Waldfrieden" he opens the package and reads his mother's letter through tears. Suddenly this section of the front, together with the wooden shed "Waldfrieden", came under French artillery fire. Everything jerks and jolts, and in the process Mother Froehlich's groschen, which were placed on the table, fall to the floor. After the attack, in which the Germans victoriously repulsed the attacking French, Lieutenant Hochstedt, deployed on the same section of the front, inspected the shot-down shelter and found a penny, which he pocketed as a "field-gray penny" as a lucky charm. His comrades in the officers' mess advise him "Lucky penny - pick it up!" Then he receives the order for a late reporting ride and sets off. On this ride, Hochstedt is hit by the bullet of a scattered Frenchman when he had just dismounted from his horse for a moment. Two German paramedics find him and take the wounded man to a hospital. There it turns out that the lucky penny, badly bent by the impact of the bullet, saved his life. Thereupon he sends this “life saver” of his bride to Germany.
Mieze Lehmann receives a 100-mark note as wages in the ammunition factory. It's the ticket with the number E 7400001. Mother Froehlich sells donation cards in front of the “iron Hindenburg” at the Victory Column. Lieutenant Hochstedt's bride comes by, and when they both discover something in common, namely that both Robert Hochstedt and Max Froehlich are on duty on the same section of the front on the Somme , the lieutenant's bride buys a donation card from the old woman. Now mother Froehlich has earned exactly one hundred marks with her Hindenburg groschen. She exchanges this at Mieze Lehmann's for the banknote she just received as wages. With their respective 100 marks - in a note and in coins - both the Froehlich and the Lehmanns sign war bonds. And so the banknote E 7400001 also returns to its place of origin, the Reichsbank.
Production notes
The field-gray groschen was commissioned by the Image and Film Office in the Union studio in Berlin-Tempelhof . The two-act film premiered in March 1917. For the cameraman Frederik Fuglsang, who was hired from Denmark, this was his first German cinema film to be documented.
In two short trick sequences, the "field-gray penny" is shown as a soldier with a penny head. The last scene in the film shows another trick sequence: There the warships depicted on the left of the banknote drive out into the open sea to do battle.
A shredded shell with the inscription “Bethlehem Works” is supposed to show that the USA intervened on the opponent's side in the war against Germany even at the time of its official neutrality.
classification
The field-gray groschen is a typical example of a film for the so-called “home front”. This was not only intended to remind of the efforts of the soldiers in the field, but also of the fact that each individual at home could make his - especially financial - contribution to the victorious end of the war.