Elser - He would have changed the world
Elser - He would have changed the world is a German feature film from 2015 . The film portrays the resistance fighter against National Socialism Georg Elser ( Christian Friedel ), whose assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler and almost the entire Nazi leadership in Munich's Bürgerbräukeller in 1939 failed. Supporting roles with Katharina Schüttler , Burghart Klaußner and Johann von Bulow occupied.
The world premiere of the historical drama took place out of competition on February 12, 2015 in the main competition of the 65th Berlinale . On April 9, 2015, exactly 70 years after Elser's death, the film was shown in German cinemas.
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The film begins with Elser's last work on the bomb, which he deposits and sharpens in a wall excavation on the balustrade in the Bürgerbräukeller. The next scenes accompany Elser on his way to Constance , where he is picked up by the customs border guard on the German side. In his detention cell he experiences the planned detonation time of the bomb. Loudspeaker announcements, which are also broadcast in Konstanz, make it clear that Hitler survived the assassination attempt.
Elser is brought to the Gestapo headquarters in Berlin. In view of the explosiveness of the case, he is interrogated by the head of the Reich Criminal Police Office Arthur Nebe and Heinrich Müller , head of the Secret State Police . The film shows him as a person with a strong personality, who treats the officers interrogating him with mockery. At first he refuses to say even his name. In the following, interrogation and torture scenes alternate with images and summery episodes from Elser's life. His love affair with Elsa Härlen, a married woman who is abused by her husband, is of central importance. When Nebe shows the "family member" Elsa, who has meanwhile been imprisoned, to the assassin , Elser decides to confess. His interrogators assume that Elser had people behind his crime and try to get their names through torture. However, Elser had no helpers and can show that he designed and built the bomb on his own. In the end Nebe believed him, but not the SS-Obergruppenführer .
Elser was imprisoned for a long time in the Dachau concentration camp and executed in the last days of the war .
production
Narrative
The script tells the film on two time levels. The first deals with the installation of the bomb in the Bürgerbräu in 1939, the interrogation under torture in the same year up to Elser's murder on April 9, 1945. Flashbacks describe how Georg Elser went from being a life-affirming person to a determined resistance fighter and how he cope with the conflict avoids sacrificing human life to prevent the immeasurable bloodshed in World War II that was foreseeable in 1939.
The representation is based on intensive research by the authors and the producers of the film, Léonie-Claire Breinersdorfer , Boris Ausserer and Fred Breinersdorfer , from 2008 until the actual start of shooting in summer 2014. Among other things, passages from the Gestapo interrogation protocols as well as the original sound of the Hitler's speech of November 8, 1939, used dramaturgically in the film.
Camera concept
The camerawoman Judith Kaufmann takes up the two-lane narrative style in her composition. While the flashbacks are shot in vivid colors with the handheld camera, the image on the first level from 1939 to 1945 remains rather rigid and in gloomy colors.
Locations
The film was not shot at the original locations, but a. Filmed in Weidenberg , in Lindau , in the Schöneberg town hall in Berlin , in the Hohenloher open air museum in Wackershofen and in South Tyrol ( Bozen , Meran , Terlan , Auer and Mendelpass ).
reception
DVD release, TV broadcast, English version
DVD and Blu-ray Disc with bonus material was released on October 22, 2015.
On February 26, 2018, Arte broadcast an abridged version of the film (89 minutes).
The same version was shown again on March 14, 2018 by Das Erste as part of the series "FilmMittwoch im Erste".
The English version, entitled 13 Minutes , was released internationally in July 2015. It is identical to the German one and has English subtitles.
Special shows
The film was shown to schoolchildren in numerous special screenings. The main actor Christian Friedel visited 48 cinemas across Germany in April 2015. On April 22, 2015, Federal President Joachim Gauck saw and discussed the film with 690 schoolchildren in the Berlin Zoo Palace . The film was shown on May 5, 2015 in the Bavarian State Parliament in front of numerous members of parliament and schoolchildren from various cities in Bavaria. On this occasion, State Parliament President Barbara Stamm presented Christian Friedel and Fred Breinersdorfer with the Silver State Parliament Medal .
Reviews
"A carefully researched and brilliantly written script by Fred and Léonie-Claire Breinersdorfer, a leading actor Christian Friedel who is convincing in every nuance and a masterful direction by Oliver Hirschbiegel make Elser an outstanding cinema event." - Jury of the Bavarian Film Prize in Die Welt / dpa , January 16, 2015
“ Elser tells, and this is rare in German cinema, about the Germans who voted for the Nazis and welcomed them enthusiastically. It is shown how a village aligns itself without recognizable resistance, soon the first woman is sitting in the market square with a sign: 'I am the biggest pig in the area and only get involved with Jews'. The crowd is whimpering. As in his film debut Das Experiment , Hirschbiegel finds oppressive images for the lack of empathy even in the followers. ”- Benjamin Moldenhauer in Spiegel Online , February 12, 2015
“You can actually count it on two fingers: a love story that ends with the lover setting off to kill Hitler and then fleeing to Switzerland is not a love story. And an assassin story that mainly consists of languishing glances, secret hugs (Elsa is married) and occasional assistance for the politically persecuted (Elser's friend Schurr is a communist) is not either. ”- Andreas Kilb in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , April 8, 2015
“The neatly assembled German Nazi film sadness shines out from the depths of this upright illustration cinema. Second-rate theater is played in the foreground. As the director of the derailed bunker office comedy 'Der Untergang', Hirschbiegel is demonstrably in his element. ”- Simon Rothöhler in taz , April 9, 2015
Awards
The film was given the rating of particularly valuable by the German Film and Media Assessment (FBW) . In February, producers Boris Ausserer and Oliver Schündler were awarded the Bavarian Film Prize for the best production for “Elser” . The producers received the award from Franz Hirth, Elser's nephew . When German Film Award in 2015 , the film was nominated in seven categories. For this film, director Oliver Hirschbiegel was awarded the Peace Prize of German Films - Die Brücke 2015. In the same year there was a nomination for the presentation of the European Film Prize for leading actor Christian Friedel. The Bundesverband Regie e. V. (BVR) awarded the German Director Prize Metropolis 2015 to Oliver Hirschbiegel for the best director in a movie and to Christian Friedel for the best male leading role.
The audio description of the film, spoken by Ilka Teichmüller , was nominated for the German Audio Film Award in the cinema category in 2016 .
Funding and audience numbers
The film production was supported by funds from German film funding with 3.5 million euros. They came from different institutions. An additional half a million euros came from South Tyrol; some scenes had been shot there. By mid-June 2015, one million euros had been collected at the box office. By then, the film had 141,000 viewers.
See also
- Georg Elser - One from Germany , film from 1989.
- Elser (radio play) , radio play produced parallel to the film.
Web links
- Elser - He would have changed the world in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Elser - He would have changed the world at filmportal.de
- Official website for the film Elser - He would have changed the world
- Materials on Elser - He would have changed the world at the Georg Elser Working Group Heidenheim
- Elser - He would have changed the world Entry on Kino.de
Individual evidence
- ^ Certificate of release for Elser - He would have changed the world . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , February 2015 (PDF; test number: 149 781 K).
- ↑ Age rating for Elser - He would have changed the world . Youth Media Commission .
- ↑ Elser. Film releases, accessed March 4, 2015 .
- ↑ Filming in 2014 on georg-elser-arbeitskreis.de. Retrieved July 12, 2015.
- ↑ ELSER - HE HAD CHANGED THE WORLD on georg-elser-arbeitskreis.de. Retrieved October 23, 2015.
- ↑ - ( Memento of the original from February 27, 2018 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.
- ↑ daserste.de
- ↑ Movie poster on georg-elser-arbeitskreis.de. Retrieved July 19, 2015.
- ^ Dpa: Bavarian film award for film about Hitler assassin Elser. In: welt.de. January 16, 2015, accessed on March 16, 2018 (quote from the reasons given by the jury for the Bavarian Film Prize, which was distributed via dpa).
- ^ Benjamin Moldenhauer: Berlinale: "Elser" by Oliver Hirschbiegel - lonely German hero. In: spiegel.de. February 12, 2015, accessed March 16, 2018 .
- ^ Andreas Kilb: Oliver Hirschbiegel's film "Elser" about George Elser's life. In: faz.net. April 8, 2015, accessed March 16, 2018 .
- ↑ Simon Rothöhler: Movie "Elser": The Führer gets so easily angry. In: taz.de. April 8, 2015, accessed March 16, 2018 .
- ^ German film and media evaluation: Elser film info and jury statement
- ↑ Filmportal.de. Retrieved February 14, 2018 .
- ^ Hermann G. Abmayr: My uncle wanted to kill Adolf Hitler . In: Badische Zeitung.de , March 25, 2015. Retrieved February 14, 2018.
- ↑ Regieverband.de. Retrieved January 6, 2016 .
- ↑ Elser - He would have changed the world in the audio film database of Hörfilm e. V.
- ↑ Honorable Society . In: Der Spiegel , 25/2015, June 13, 2015, pp. 126–130
