Elmar Klos

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Elmar Klos (1966)

Elmar Klos (born January 26, 1910 in Brno , † July 19, 1993 in Prague ) was a Czech scriptwriter and film director . Together with Ján Kadár he created, among other things, the award-winning film The Business on Hauptstraße .

Live and act

As a high school student, Elmar Klos wrote five scripts for films by the Czech director Svatopluk Innemann together with his uncle Josef Skružný . These were three silent film comedies with Vlasta Burian in the lead role: Falesná kocicka (1926), Lásky Kacenky Strnadové (1926) and Milenky starého kriminálníka (1927), as well as sound films from 1932 and 1934.

After graduating from high school, Klos began studying law at Charles University in Prague , which he broke off. He worked in various fields of activity in the film industry and appeared in small film roles, including as a student in Innemann's drama Vor der Matura in 1932 . In 1935, Klos took over the management of a newly founded film studio of the Bata group in Zlín , where he shot advertising and educational films until the mid-1940s. In 1935 he married Anna Vopáiková, with whom he had a son and a daughter.

During the occupation of Czechoslovakia by the Germans in World War II, Klos was involved in preparations for the nationalization of the Czech film industry. After the establishment of the National Film Archive in 1943, he carried out appropriate planning with Vladislav Vančura and Otakar Vávra . After the war he took on various administrative positions, including managing the production company “Krátký film” (short films). The drama Mrtvý mezi zivými , directed by Borivoj Zeman , in which he worked as a screenwriter and co-producer, is one of his films from this period . It was a film adaptation of the novel To levende og en død by Sigurd Christiansen . From 1948 Klos worked as a production manager, screenwriter and director for the Barrandov film studios .

Klos' long-term cooperation with the Slovak film director and screenwriter Ján Kadár began around 1952 . They developed a relatively fixed division of labor, in which Kadár preferred to work with the actors during filming, while Klos concentrated on film preparation and follow-up. In contrast to later works, Klos and Kadár took up a plot typical of Stalinist propaganda in their first film, the thriller Die Entführung (1953). In it, a group of opponents of the communist regime established in 1948 hijacked a Czechoslovak plane to Munich. Despite all attempts by the American secret service to prevent the inmates from returning home, most remain loyal to their country. The duo's second production was their musical, satirical comedy Musik vom Mars , which, however, hardly met with approval. An der Endstation followed two years later , an apolitical film that tells episodic stories of the fate of simple people in a tenement house. On the other hand, Klos and Kadár criticized grievances in everyday socialist life indirectly with their fairytale-like comedy Three Wishes (1958), a film adaptation of the play of the same name by Vratislav Blažek . The film fell victim to censorship and was not released until 1963. Her literary film adaptation of Death is called Angel, based on a novel by Ladislav Mňačko , was also released that year . The realistic war film is about a seriously wounded partisan who remembers his operations and the atrocities experienced on both sides in flashbacks. In 1965, the collaboration between the two filmmakers culminated in the Oscar- winning film The Business on Hauptstrasse , which was based on a story by Ladislav Grosman and was one of the few contemporary films from Central Europe that openly dealt with the persecution of Jews during the Nazi regime deal with it. The film The Defendant , published in the same year , about the director of an electricity company on trial who pays his workers excessive premiums in order to meet party requirements, was also a success and won the main prize at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival . With their works, Klos and Kadár were now among the most important representatives of the Czechoslovak New Wave , the "golden years" of Czechoslovak cinema in the 1960s.

In 1968 Klos qualified as a professor and until 1971 taught film directing at the film and television faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts (FAMU). However, after the crackdown on the Prague Spring , he was expelled from the party, the Barrandov film studios and the FAMU. While Kádár emigrated to the USA, Klos stayed in Prague and worked as a civil engineer in the 1970s and 1980s.

From 1990 Klos was able to teach again at FAMU. He was also active as a film critic and wrote essays. He died in Prague at the age of 83.

Awards (selection)

Filmography (selection)

  • 1926: Falesná kocicka
  • 1926: Lásky Kacenky Strnadové
  • 1927: Milenky starého kriminálníka
  • 1932: Before the Matura ( Pred maturitou )
  • 1932: Senkýrka u divoké krásy
  • 1934: Tri kroky od tela
  • 1937: V dome strasí duch (short film)
  • 1937: Silnice zpivá (short film)
  • 1937: Kolem dokola (short film)
  • 1938: Pojdte s námi
  • 1938: History of fíkového listu
  • 1938: Andrej Hlinka o sobe
  • 1939: Ctyri lidé, jedna rec
  • 1941: Chvála révy
  • 1945: Tri knoflíky
  • 1946: Dvakrát kaucuk
  • 1947: Prazský hrad
  • 1947: Mrtvý mezi zivými
  • 1949: IX. Sjezd KSC
  • 1953: The kidnapping ( Únos )
  • 1955: Music from Mars ( Hudba z Marsu )
  • 1956: Mladé dny (documentary film)
  • 1957: At the end of the line ( Tam na konecne )
  • 1958: Three wishes ( Tri prání )
  • 1959: The rehearsal continues ( Zkouska pokracuje )
  • 1960: Magic lantern II
  • 1963: Death is called Engelchen ( Smrt si rika Engelchen )
  • 1965: The Shop on Main Street ( Obchod na korze )
  • 1965: The Defendant (Obzalovany)
  • 1970: Touha zvaná Anada
  • 1989: Bison ( Bizon )

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Grzegorz Balski: Klos, Elmar In: Directory of Eastern European film-makers and films, 1945-1991. Flicks Books, Trowbridge 1992, p. 167.
  2. ↑ Josef Tomeš, Alena Léblová: Klos, Elmar In: Československý biografický slovník. Academia, Prague 1992, ISBN 80-200-0443-2 , access via the Cesky biograficky archiv a Slovensky biograficky archiv, p. 401.
  3. ^ Peter Hames: Czech and Slovak Cinema: Theme and Tradition. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh 2009, pp. 10-11.
  4. ^ Georges Sadou: Klos, Elmar In: Dictionary of Film Makers. University of California Press, Berkeley 1972, pp. 138-139.
  5. ^ Mira Liehm, Antonín Jaroslav Liehm : The Most Important Art: Eastern European Film After 1945. University of California Press, Berkeley 1977, ISBN 0-520-03157-1 , p. 226.
  6. ↑ 14. MFF Karlovy Vary kviff.com, accessed on January 13, 2014.
  7. ↑ Eric Pace: Elmar Klos, 83, Czech Film Maker Who Won Oscar. In: The New York Times August 2, 1993, accessed January 13, 2014.
personal data
SURNAME Toilets, Elmar
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Czech screenwriter and film director
DATE OF BIRTH January 26, 1910
PLACE OF BIRTH Brno
DATE OF DEATH July 19, 1993
Place of death Prague