The heathen von Kummerow and their funny pranks
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | The heathen von Kummerow and their funny pranks |
| Country of production |
Federal Republic of Germany / GDR |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1967 |
| length | 94 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 6 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Werner Jacobs |
| script |
Kurt Hahne Eberhard Keindorff Johanna Sibelius |
| production | Walter Koppel |
| music | Rolf A. Wilhelm |
| camera | Günter Haubold |
| cut | Monika Schindler |
| occupation | |
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| chronology | |
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Successor → |
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Die Heiden von Kummerow and their funny pranks is a German comedy film by Werner Jacobs from 1967. It is based on the novel Die Heiden von Kummerow by Ehm Welk from 1937 and was the first official film collaboration between the Federal Republic of Germany and the GDR.
action
The village of Kummerow in Pomerania around 1906: Shortly before the Easter break, the local children come up with another prank to annoy Cantor Kannegießer. They put a plastered sign on the seat of their teacher, who, however, appears on the last day of school accompanied by Pastor Breithaupt and Superintendent Sanftleben. The best in class this year is Martin Grambauer, whom the pastor spontaneously appoints as a church boy. After a few embarrassing incidents - so Sanftleben asks Johannes Bärensprung, who was born out of wedlock and lives in the poor house, as his father is called - the children say goodbye to the holidays. At the end of the day it is gentle life who sits down on the plastered sign on which an Easter greeting to teacher "Kannepisser" is written.
The boys move to the traditional heather dots, which Pastor Breithaupt banned last year. While eating with the superintendent, the pastor explains what the meanwhile no longer practiced custom is all about. The Kummerower defended themselves a long time ago against Christianization by simply staying in the water during the planned baptism in the river. Since none of the authorities who wanted to convert them to the Christian faith endured it longer in the water than they did, they remained unconverted in the end. At Heidendöpen, the local boys stand in the nearby stream. Whoever stays last in the cold water becomes king of the heathen. Unbeknownst to the pastor, the boys are also running the competition this year. The winner was Johannes Bärensprung, whom the watching girls, however, ridiculed as “the rag king”. The referee of the competition is cowherd Krischan, who, as he has done for eleven years, has come to Kummerow again for Easter. As in every year, he was hosted by Müller Düker. Düker threatens to chase Krischan out of the village. However, the children love Krischan and welcomed him enthusiastically.
When the pastor hears about the heathen dope, he gets angry, but it is Martin Grambauer's father Gottlieb who rhetorically defeats him. The socialist has something against the church, which prevents progress, and likes to engage in intellectual battles with the pastor, which he usually wins. Although he is in the church and has to fulfill the associated duties, he always tries to crush the pastor. When his daughter, like all the other children, has to give the pastor a goose to be blessed, Gottlieb worries about a skinny old goose, as nowhere is it written how the goose should be made. Gottlieb's daughter refuses to hand over this goose and so Martin has to take on the task. He turns to Krischan for help, who secretly exchanges Grambauer's goose for the most beautiful of the geese that have already been delivered. The pastor is pleasantly surprised by the beautiful goose and later profusely thanks Gottlieb for the magnificent specimen. Gottlieb is irritated, believing that the pastor was trying to make fun of him.
The festively dressed children appear for the blessing when a commotion breaks out in front of the church. Müller Düker has bought a new horse for his single horse, but the horse is obviously not made for it. It is sensitive and nervous. When the farmers tease him that he had let himself be fooled into buying, Düker mercilessly drives the horse around the church square and whips it into a rage. Krischan steps in and tries to snatch the whip from him, but culvert knocks him down. The children try to overpower culverts and other men and women also intervene, but culinary anger does not even stop at the pastor who has come out of church. When he insults him, Pastor Breithaupt knocks him down. Düker reports this. Since he cannot report the pastor, he files a complaint against Krischan. He has no papers, which has been fine with the woeers for the past eleven years, since he has worked for them so free. While information is being obtained about Krischan and his identity, the village is opposed to culverts. The children in particular play numerous pranks on him to chase him out of the village.
In the end, they throw in the windows of his house and put a straw dummy in his yard, which shoots culverts with his rifle. The police are less interested in the vandalism than in Düker's rifle. Düker was once accused of poaching in which a forester was shot; but Düker claimed that he had no rifle. Now the rifle is being confiscated for investigation. The culprit's hatred of Krischan, who caught him poaching, but did not testify against him because he wanted to avoid contact with the police himself, also dates from the time of poaching. Research shows that Krischan was imprisoned for eight years of manslaughter and became a cowherd after his release. Because of his criminal past and because the villagers now have to pay him wages, since his identity has been clarified and he is given papers again, the town council decides to dismiss him and sends him away. When the police brought Krischan's new papers over, the officer pointed out that the Kummerower had to pay the necessary taxes retrospectively for his eleven years of black employment. That's why they want to keep Krischan after all, and the children bring him back to the village. He will stay because the villagers also want to respond to his demands - accommodation, food, payment. At the entrance to the village, the children and Krischan meet two police officers with the arrested culvert. The forester was once shot from his rifle. Düker will now have to answer for his actions.
production
In the course of the program declaration for the defense of the unity of German culture by the Ministry of Culture of the GDR, the GDR began to work more closely with German and international actors from the beginning of 1954. The first films with West German actors were made, including 1953 Solvay secret files with Leny Marenbach and 1954 Carola Lamberti - Eine vom Zirkus with Henny Porten . In 1955 the first negotiations began for an all-German production of Thomas Mann's Die Buddenbrooks , which, however, dragged on and was discontinued in 1958, among other things for political reasons. Other plans, such as an all-German remake of the film Traumulus , also failed. Indirect pan-German productions were the German-Swedish co-productions Leuchtfeuer , Das Fräulein von Scuderi , Spielbank-Affäre and Die Schönste , which the West German Erich Mehl organized with DEFA.
The first official pan-German film collaboration came with Die Heiden von Kummerow and their funny pranks . Although DEFA did not act as an equal co-producer, in addition to the actors, it provided the technology, editing rooms and staff members. In return, she received “the exploitation rights for the socialist countries for her foreign trade operations.” The film was produced by the German production companies Neue Deutsche Filmgesellschaft (NDF) Munich-Geiselgasteig and Neue Realfilm Walter Koppel from Hamburg.
The shooting ran from May 17 to July 17, 1967 at various locations on Rügen and not far from Ueckermünde . The main location was the small village of Vilmnitz , now a part of Putbus . Individual scenes were shot in the village of Krakvitz near Putbus, in which the “Old Wash House”, which still exists today, can be seen. Various scenes, such as the blessing ceremony, took place at and in the Maria Magdalena Church in Vilmnitz.
The film opened in German cinemas on December 21, 1967 and was released in GDR cinemas on January 19, 1968. It was also seen for the first time on TV on January 1, 1976 in the ARD program. In 1982 DEFA provided Die Gerechten von Kummerow, an indirect cinematic continuation of the Heiden von Kummerow , which takes up parts of the Ehm-Welk material already used in this film.
criticism
The contemporary criticism of the GDR wrote that in the film "Welks coarse, North German humor is convincingly made visible"; “Not much remains of the poetic depth of the book, however, because the film oscillates between slapstick and sentimentality”. The film is "harmlessly entertaining, in any case more harmless than you can read it in Ehm Welk", so other critics.
For the service movie- was The Heathens of Kummerow a "realized with the support of the DEFA West German production, dedicated social-political background of the novel excludes almost entirely and into the realms of colorful home movie settled remains. Template-like, occasionally crude entertainment in the style of a nostalgic picture book ”. The Evangelische Film-Beobachter also criticizes the fact that the material was processed “too naively and without a touch of irony” for the film, but praises that it leaves “a better impression” than “the average product of the home film genre thanks to the carefully selected cast” . "
Award
The German Film and Media Assessment (FBW) awarded the film in 1967 the title “valuable”.
literature
- F.-B. Habel : The great lexicon of DEFA feature films . Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-89602-349-7 , pp. 238-239 .
Web links
- The Heathens of Kummerow in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The Heiden von Kummerow and their funny pranks at filmportal.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ Ralf Schenk: In the middle of the Cold War 1950 to 1960 . In:. Ralf Schenk (Red.), Filmmuseum Potsdam (Ed.): The second life of the film city Babelsberg. DEFA feature films 1946–1992 . Henschel, Berlin 1994, p. 86.
- ↑ Ralf Schenk: In the middle of the Cold War 1950 to 1960 . In:. Ralf Schenk (Red.), Filmmuseum Potsdam (Ed.): The second life of the film city Babelsberg. DEFA feature films 1946–1992 . Henschel, Berlin 1994, p. 92.
- ↑ The Heiden von Kummerow and their funny pranks . In: F.-B. Habel: The great lexicon of DEFA feature films . Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2000, p. 239.
- ↑ Die Heiden von Kummerow ( Memento of the original from June 6, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. - The Ehm-Welk - novel was filmed 40 years ago on Rügen. (Interview with Jörg Resler , the actor who played Martin Grambauer), Der Rüganer - Ostsee-Anzeiger, September 19, 2007, accessed on October 22, 2009
- ↑ Old wash house in Krakvitz
- ^ Lothar Kusche in: Weltbühne , No. 8, 1968.
- ↑ Volker Baer in: Tagesspiegel , March 7, 1968.
- ↑ The Heiden von Kummerow and their funny pranks. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .
- ↑ Evangelischer Presseverband München, Review No. 6/1968
- ↑ The Heiden von Kummerow and their funny pranks at filmportal.de
