The small border traffic (film)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The small border traffic |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1943 |
| length | 83 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Hans Deppe |
| script | Erich Kästner based on his novel "Georg and the Incidents" (1938) |
| production | Hans Schönmetzler for UFA Filmkunst GmbH |
| music | Ludwig Schmidseder |
| camera | Kurt Schulz |
| occupation | |
| |
The Little Border Traffic is a German feature film from 1943 based on a screenplay by Erich Kästner based on his novel Georg und die Incident (1938). In the leading roles play Hertha Feiler and Willy Fritsch , the Director led Hans Deppe .
action
The laughter researcher Dr. Dr. Dr. Georg Rentmeister wants to visit his friend Karl in Salzburg , but a foreign exchange restriction that existed at the time between the German Reich and Austria requires an application to the foreign exchange office in order to be able to finance the vacation. The scientist has been waiting for his trip to be approved for weeks. During a presentation of his laughter research, the privy councilor invited him to use the so-called small border traffic between the cities of Bad Reichenhall and Salzburg in order to circumvent the sanction. The holidaymakers take their quarters in the German spa town, but take the bus to the Austrian festival city during the day. Only the local financial resources in Salzburg are limited, because only ten Reichsmarks can be exported from Germany to Austria per month . Dr. Rentmeister calculates his 30-day vacation and decides to start the trip. However, he quickly reached the limit of his possibilities on site.
Impressed by the traditional hat fashion prevalent in Salzburg, he first buys a traditional hat for the price of his entire holiday budget. Then he goes to the Glockenspiel café to meet his friend Karl and orders a coffee. Karl, however, is sitting in Café Tomaselli . The two gentlemen miss each other.
Dr. Rentmeister waits in vain and orders water for water, as he cannot leave the café without beating the bill. In the meantime, a young lady sits down at the next table and immediately catches the scientist's eye. He, too, attracts her attention, but she is more amused by the numerous water glasses on his table. After an hour, he finally takes his heart out, describes the young woman his mishap and asks her to pay for his drinks. The couple goes for a walk together while Konstanze, the young woman's name, does some shopping. As a farewell, Dr. Rentmeister she and is so enchanted that he overlooks his friend Karl, who is sitting in the market square. Konstanze returns home to Reichenau Castle, where she works as a chambermaid. The scientist drives back to Bad Reichenhall and shortly afterwards receives a call from Karl who clears up the misunderstanding with the café.
Completely penniless, Dr. Rentmeister returned to Salzburg the next day, where he again made an appointment with Konstanze. During another walk, Konstanze tells her admirer about her job as a housemaid, who is currently paid particularly well because the owner of the castle is away and has rented the castle to a rich manufacturer who pays good tips. The couple, now numbering around dozen, agree to go on a hike in the Salzkammergut the day after next. To Georg's surprise, Konstanze drives up in a car that the count has given her for the day off. They go to a lake to swim, are surprised by the thunderstorm and finally end up at Salzburg Central Station, where they eat the bread that Georg brought with them to save money. Georg misses his train and wants to stay with Karl, but his friend is not at home. So Konstanze quickly invites Georg into her room, where he is supposed to spend the night on the sofa. In the dark, however, Konstanze shows him the way to her bed. The next morning, Georg proposes to her in the palace gardens. Konstanze agrees. Since she has to work, Georg spends the rest of the day with Karl.
It is also Karl who appears in Georg's place to meet Konstanze the next day. He reveals to her that he had seen her as Countess Konstanze accompanied by Count Franz in the casino and reported this to Georg. So Georg would not come, but plan to leave. Konstanze is horrified and wants to clear up the misunderstanding immediately. She informs Franz, who immediately travels to Bad Reichenhall and tells Georg about the connections. In fact, Konstanze is currently a housemaid, but he is her brother, and like the rest of the family, both of them work as servants in the castle. Because the count has not even gone away with his family, but works as a sideline writer on a play about how the Austrian nobility, disguised as servants, dealt with newly wealthy North German holidaymakers housed in the castle. The masking is owed to the research purposes and the true servants are free. Georg and Konstanze, waiting in front of the hotel, are reconciled, and Georg is invited to the castle as a further guest, where his father incorporates him as a welcome additional character in his play to be written. Through an indiscretion by the manufacturer's daughter, it comes to light that Konstanze and the new guest already knew each other, so that Konstanze was dismissed and left the castle with Georg. When it also turned out that the factory owner's family had also been informed about the count's family's role reversal and merely played their role themselves, the count decided not to write any more, but asked the versatile Georg to finish the piece at the later engagement dinner.
Production notes
The small border traffic was filmed in Bad Reichenhall as well as Salzburg and the surrounding area in autumn 1942 . The film is characterized by numerous city and landscape views, some of which are supplemented by a city tour in Salzburg embedded in the plot. The remaining recordings took place in the Berlin-Tempelhof film studios until December 1942 .
The film, which was examined on April 1, 1943, premiered on April 22, 1943 in Frankfurt . The Berlin premiere followed two months later in the Marmorhaus cinema .
Erich Kästner had written the script, as well as the script for the film Münchhausen , developed for the 25th anniversary of the UFA , with special permission from the Propaganda Ministry under the pseudonym Berthold Bürger, based on a story he had experienced himself and already written down in the novel Georg and the Incidents . When Hitler found out about the true authorship, he immediately issued a publication ban, so that Bürger alias Kästner was not mentioned in the opening credits of the film.
The script was remade under the title Salzburg Stories in 1956 with Marianne Koch and Paul Hubschmid in the leading roles, directed by Kurt Hoffmann .
Reviews
“But we want to try not to see more in a film that is made up of good ideas than what it claims to be, namely to be a funny piece, even in serious times. Seen in this way, this film has its value and its purpose. "
"A gallant love comedy"
Individual evidence
- ↑ Kästner's trip to the spa town in: Heimatblätter from September 16, 2019 , accessed on February 8, 2020
- ↑ The small border traffic. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed February 8, 2020 .
Web links
- The small border traffic in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The small border traffic at filmportal.de