The Bat (1946)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The bat |
 | |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1946 |
| length | 2827 meters / 103 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Géza from Bolváry |
| script | Ernst Marischka |
| production |
Terra Film DEFA (completion) |
| music |
Johann Strauss Alois Melichar (arrangement) |
| camera | Willy Winterstein |
| cut | Alice Ludwig |
| occupation | |
| |
Die Fledermaus is a film adaptation of the operetta Die Fledermaus by Johann Strauss, filmed in Agfacolor in 1944 and first performed in 1946 .
action
After a costume ball, the director Falke, who is already a bit battered and disguised as a bat , asks his friend Eisenstein to bring him home. Instead of doing Falke a favor, Eisenstein leaves those who will soon be sleeping on a park bench to their fate.
The next morning, Falke is arrested and locked up. Prison director Frank lets Falke stay in the cell for a few hours, although he is good friends with him. Falke decides to return the favor to Eisenstein and Frank.
When Falke took over the artistic direction of a lavish party for his friend Prince Orlofsky, he was given the opportunity to take revenge, as Eisenstein and Frank wanted to take part in the party for different reasons and asked Falke for the necessary tickets. Eisenstein really wants to get to know a Hungarian artist who is expected at the festival and who is supposed to resemble his wife except for the hair color. Frank would like to be paired with a young blonde actress by Falke.
Falke has tickets for both. Since Eisenstein is supposed to serve a sentence at the time of the festival, Falke pretends to have obtained a reprieve from Frank. Falke also arranges for his tenor Melzer Eisenstein's wife Rosalinde to court. Eisenstein swindles his wife and instead of going to arrest, he goes to the festival. Frank, who wants to arrest Eisenstein, finds the tenor Melzer at Rosalinde's house, takes him for Eisenstein, and arrests him. Rosalinde has meanwhile found out about her husband's dizziness. Since the Hungarian artist has already canceled the festival, she has her hair dyed, visits the festival and pretends to be the said Hungarian.
At the festival, Johann Strauss performed parts of his latest operetta Die Fledermaus at the instigation of Falkes . For the duration of this performance, Falke manages to release his locked tenor Melzer. Rosalinde's maid Adele also takes part in the performance and is then introduced to Frank by Falke.
In her disguise, Rosalinde lets herself be infatuated by her husband and then gives the appearance of being seduced by Orlofksy. In fact, she makes sure that Orlofsky spends the night with Adele. The next day, while still in disguise, she reveals herself to her husband, who then wants to duel with Orlofsky. Falke clarifies the situation.
background
Most of the film was shot in Prague in 1944 in the Barrandov film studios and completed in the Babelsberg film studio . After air raids, the film was considered lost or lost until 1946. Only then was material found so that Alice Ludwig, who was responsible for editing, could finish the film. With an original length of 103 minutes, the strip was first performed in 1946 in the Soviet sector of Berlin . Since 1950, versions with a duration of 99 minutes have been available.
In the 1990s, the only source material for television broadcasts was a copy that was sharp, but with very poor color. After finding a copy in a Berlin archive that was very well preserved in color, but fuzzy and with Russian subtitles, a sharp copy in the original colors was finally made using modern technology.
The version with a playing time of 99 minutes was restored and released on DVD in 2005 (playing time on PAL-DVD 95 minutes).
Reviews
- "The confused plot with the immortal melodies in a comparatively elegant film version." - Lexicon of international film
- "Spraying color film (...) Morally partially unsatisfactory." - 6000 films, 1963
Web links
- The bat in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The bat at filmportal.de
- The bat on the website of the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation
- German-Russian association gives the "bat" fresh color
- New colors for Heesters' old film operetta
Individual evidence
- ↑ Booklet accompanying the “De luxe” DVD
- ↑ The bat. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .
- ↑ 6000 films. Critical notes from the cinema years 1945 to 1958 . Handbook V of the Catholic film criticism, 3rd edition, Verlag Haus Altenberg, Düsseldorf 1963, p. 116