An Enemy of the People (1937)

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Movie
Original title An enemy of the people
Country of production Germany
original language German
Publishing year 1937
length 101 minutes
Age rating FSK 6
Rod
Director Hans Steinhoff
script Erich Ebermayer
Hans Steinhoff
production Otto Lehmann
Hans von Wolzüge
music Clemens Schmalstich
Werner Bochmann
camera Karl Puth
Bruno Mondi
cut Gertrud Hinz
occupation

Ein Volksfeind is a German film drama from 1937 directed by Hans Steinhoff . The main roles are occupied by Heinrich George , Franziska Kinz , Herbert Hübner and Carsta Löck . The script goes back to Henrik Ibsen's socially critical drama of the same name (OT: En Folkefiende ).

action

Dr. med. Hans Stockmann is a doctor with his own practice in a small town. When his ambitious brother became mayor of the health resort Trimburg, he was reluctant to accept the latter's call to work there as a spa doctor. The doctor very much displeases the sanitary facilities there, he demands that they be renovated. The water, which is presented to the guests of the bathing resort as medicinal water, turns out to be heavily polluted during an inspection, which is largely due to the sewage from the tannery, which is run by the richest man in the town. Thanks to the healing spring, Trimburg has only become a prosperous health resort. Not only the main decision-makers, but also Stockmann's brother opposed the doctor. They see the health resort status of Trimburg in jeopardy and with it the source of money that has swelled their bank account. The hostility to which the spa doctor is suddenly exposed is increasingly escalating.

In a public lecture in which Stockmann reveals the facts and denounces the inaction of those responsible, it turns out that a large majority do not want to know about it and turn against him, even declaring him an enemy of the people. Resigned, Stockmann makes the decision to return with his family to his former place of work in the small town when the responsible minister, who has learned of the incidents, steps in and takes Stockmann's side. As a result, the “enemy of the people” that was seen in him has been fully rehabilitated. Suddenly the majority of the place stands behind him and shows how fickle the individual is. Stockmann's reform proposals are implemented.

Production notes

The production company was FDF Fabrication German Films GmbH (Berlin). The production management lay with Hans von Wolzüge and Otto Lehmann, the recording management with Wolfgang Schubert. The shooting took place in July / August 1937 in Glücksburg and the Flensburg Fjord . The film structures come from Hermann Warm and Carl Haacker . Terra Filmkunst GmbH (Berlin) took over the first distribution of the film .

An enemy of the people was subjected to an FSK test by the censors under number 53761 on March 15, 1983 and released from the age of six.

For more films see → Ein Volksfeind - Film Adaptations

Difference to the literary original

Henrik Ibsen's socially critical drama dates back to 1882 and was written by the author in response to criticism of two other of his dramas. In contrast to the original, Ebermayer and Steinhoff relocated the material to the time when the Weimar Republic ended and the National Socialist German Workers' Party under Adolf Hitler came to power. The content of the naturalistic drama as well as the film is the conflict a spa doctor gets into when the dignitaries of the small spa town defend their hypocritical and corrupt approach and instead defame the spa doctor as an enemy of the people. In the original artwork, the piece is set in a coastal town in southern Norway. The doctor's first name is Thomas and not Hans, as in the film. His wife is called Kathrine (Käte) and not Johanna. His daughter is called Petra, as in the film, and is a teacher. His sons are named Eilif (13 years) and Morten (10 years) in the drama and not Walter and Frederik as in the film. In Ibsen's play, in which Thomas Stockmann temporarily considers emigrating to America and does not want to go back to his former place of work, as in the film, he decides to stay now against all odds in order to free his sons with the help of his daughter To raise noble men and to give these lessons to other children so that free thinkers can grow up. Stockmann agrees with his family that they will not bow to the ruling class. For him it is clear that the strongest man in the world is the one who stands alone . He will stay in the spa and fight for truth and freedom. In the film, on the other hand, everything turns around in Stockmann's direction through the intervention of the responsible minister when the state transformed from the Weimar Republic under the new leadership into a National Socialist one.

Film start

In Germany, the film opened on October 26, 1937. The Berlin premiere was on November 15, 1937 in the Capitol.

  • Title Austria: Ein Volksfeind , long title Ein Volksfeind - The secret of a doctor
  • Title France: Un ennemi du peuple
  • Title Poland: Wróg ludu
  • Worldwide title (English): An Enemy of the People

The film was also released on DVD.

criticism

At filmportal.de you can read: " NS film that ideologically 'bends' Ibsen's original."

Berlinien.de found that the film was "dramatic, sad and tragic" at the same time.

Karlheinz Wendtland spoke of a “falsification of the play written by Henrik Ibsen in 1882” insofar as “director Steinhoff relocated the material to the Weimar Republic and only allowed the state to intervene after the Nazi seizure of power”. Wendtland went on to explain that although the film had been "banned by the Allies", it had received "FSK approval". A measure that seems “basically justified”, “but [leave open] certain reservations about the film”.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ An enemy of the people at murnau-stiftung.de
  2. ↑ An enemy of the people ( Memento of the original from November 26, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. DVD  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.marktplaza.be
  3. ↑ An Enemy at filmportal.de
  4. ^ Ein Volksfeind (1937) at berlinien.de, accessed on November 24, 2015.
  5. ^ Karlheinz Wendtland: Beloved Kintopp. All German feature films from 1929–1945 with numerous artist biographies born in 1937 and 1938, Verlag Medium Film Karlheinz Wendtland, Berlin, second revised edition, Film 94/1937, p. 95, ISBN 3-926945-02-8