Epilogue - The Secret of the Orplid
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Epilogue - The Secret of the Orplid |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1950 |
| length | 91 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 18 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Helmut Käutner |
| script |
Robert A. Stemmle Helmut Käutner |
| production |
Artur Brauner for CCC-Film |
| music | Bernhard Eichhorn |
| camera | Werner Krien |
| cut | Johanna Meisel |
| occupation | |
| |
Epilog - The Secret of Orplid is a German political thriller and film noir from 1950. Artur Brauner produced the film based on the model of The Third Man , but for various reasons could not build on its success.
content
In the opening credits, inscriptions refer to several puzzling ship accidents and plane crashes in recent times, which apparently have a political background.
The journalist Peter Zabel stumbled upon the sinking of the luxury yacht Orplid through a newspaper note in Hamburg on August 14, 1949 , which was on a pleasure trip from Hamburg to Scotland with a wedding party of artists . Out of personal curiosity, Zabel begins research.
A meteorologist confirmed that the weather was good for the journey time. The Boatyard of Orplid in Vegesack can only tell him that the Orplid for a high functionary of the Nazi party built and after the Second World War, often by the military government had been booked for travel. However, the shipyard owners give him the address of the hiring office that was responsible for hiring the last crew. In the office, Zabel learns that a planned crew member, the steward, has been replaced at the last minute. Zabel can find this man, Drobitsch, on the Reeperbahn in the samba bar , but Drobitsch goes into hiding after a conversation with Zabel. The bar girl warns him: "Keep your hands off politics".
After Drobitsch's disappearance, Zabel's research came to nothing, but by chance he came across artistic drawings in a shop window in London that could only have come from Orplid . From a photo of the wedding party, he recognizes that the painter of the pictures, Leata, was on board the Orplid . She appears to be the only survivor. Since she has lost the language and is unable to write, she records the story of the yacht's sinking for Zabel. Both go with the material to the publisher Beckmann of Mondial-Verlag, to whom they tell the story:
There was a bomb aboard the yacht that was supposed to kill one of the wedding guests: Mr. Hill, an international arms dealer who does business in the Middle East . The pianist was a member of an unknown organization that intended to carry out the assassination attempt. The alleged steward Lund, who, according to the piano player's belief, hid the bomb, was actually FBI agent Captain Bannister, who only found out in a conversation with his alleged accomplice that a bomb was on board. Actually, Bannister's job was to watch Mr. Hoopman, who chartered the yacht, as he was suspected of smuggling arms.
In the middle of the high seas, the Orplid took over a passenger from a Swedish freighter - Mr. Hill, because of whom the bomb is on board. Bannister / Lund tried to identify himself to the crew and passengers, but was mistaken for the assassin, as his ID was stolen by the pianist. In a wild panic, everyone tried to find the bomb; an escape was out of the question because the piano player destroyed all other means of rescue before fleeing with a lifeboat.
Out of anger at the steward (or FBI agent), the groom seriously injured Lund. When the latter sank down, dying, he found the bomb and threw it overboard. Mr. Hill, not knowing that the bomb had been found, accidentally opened a flood valve and caused the Orplid to sink. Apart from Leata, nobody could save himself.
While Zabel Beckmann reports on the sinking of the Orplid , the editor-in-chief Dr. Mannheim a. He refuses to publish the story because he fears consequences for his company due to the political background of the arms trade in the Middle East. When Zabel and Leata leave Beckmann's office, the pianist and other gang members lie in wait for them in the publishing house. The pianist stabs Zabel in a paternoster , Leata pulls a pistol from the murderer's jacket pocket and shoots him. The Orplid's secret is kept.
Background and production history
Based on an idea by Brauner, Stemmle and Käutner wrote a screenplay that was supposedly based on contemporary press reports about the mysterious sinking of a South American yacht and a fishing cutter. The origin of the Orplid as a yacht of a Nazi functionary relates to the luxury yacht Carin II Hermann Göring , which also plays a role in the feature film Schtonk .
The film was made in a shooting time of officially 35 days in the CCC studios Berlin-Spandau and on the Havel in Berlin. Emil Hasler designed the film structures. The epilogue subtitle The Secret of Orplid can be traced back to Du bist Orplid, my country from Weyla's song by Eduard Mörike .
Despite Käutner's daily work for 17 hours, the production time lasted two months and was thus twice as long as a conventional film in this category. The most expensive was the prop, a converted freight barge on the river Havel, who as Orplid acted on which the exteriors were filmed. The drawings of the Orplid (Leata's drawings in London) came from the well-known draftsman and illustrator Bele Bachem .
The film had its world premiere during the International Film Festival in Venice on September 7, 1950. The German premiere took place on September 29, 1950 in Hamburg and Dortmund.
criticism
Despite brilliant acting performances, the camera work and the successful use of music, the “symbolic teardrop” fell through with the audience. In a detailed review in Der Spiegel , the main reason was the weak script, which had serious logical errors. The background was Brauner's intention to finish the film in time for the 1950 Biennale . The 700,000 DM invested turned out to be a “blatant failure in the cinemas” despite the star's expense, despite or precisely because the film was “much praised and decried” by the critics.
For the first home cinema release of the film at the beginning of 2015, Rajko Burchardt praised Helmut Käutner's directors and their handling of genre media on kino-zeit.de. The film deserves a "rediscovery on DVD not only in terms of film, but also in terms of contemporary history".
Quotes
One of the shipyard owners in conversation with Zabel:
Well, the yacht was built in 1936/37. On behalf of a high party man.
Zabel: Probably also at the expense of the party.
Shipyard owner: In the end, at all of us.
Zabel after talking to the bar girl (inner monologue):
Politics! That was when the word was used for the first time. So no crime! But there are also political crimes.
Mrs. Eleanor Hopman in conversation with Klaus von Werth:
You Europeans are still playing company. I thought you didn't have anything like that anymore, Herr von Werth.
From Werth:
You can't get out of your skin. You're right. We really don't have anything like that anymore. Everyone is alone. The only thing left is: save yourself who can. But who can?
Dr. Mannheim in conversation with Zabel:
By the way, I find it very clever that they only hint at these things. The public has had enough of politics anyway.
Zabel:
I have only now passed over the political facts in the storytelling. Everything is detailed in the manuscript. I know all of the material, I name all of them. From the big backers to the smallest action group. On the day these revelations appear in their paper ...
Dr. Mannheim:
... I'm finished ... In my newspaper nothing about politics. Politics is always black and white. That makes gray. I have a colored magazine ... I want to tell you something. Make a novel out of it. And soften a few extremities and expand the love story and find some other motive for the assassination. Something completely normal, for example, a maniac put the bomb or something.
literature
- Epilogue. Big stars at low prices . In: Der Spiegel , No. 34, 1950, p. 34f. ( Online )
- Epilogue (The Secret of Orplid) . In: 6000 films. Critical notes from the cinema years 1945 to 1958 . Düsseldorf 1959, p. 99.
Editions
- Epilog - The Secret of Orplid , Toppic Video circa 1980.
- Epilog - The Secret of Orplid , Pidax film media Ltd., DVD, 2014
Web links
- Epilogue - The secret of Orplid in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Epilog - The Orplid's Secret at filmportal.de
- Epilog - The Secret of Orplid in the Lexicon of International Films
Individual evidence
- ^ CineGraph - Lexicon for German-language film - Helmut Käutner . In contrast to the rest of the world, only the number of days of shooting without calendar information is given here.
- ↑ Just yes no politics ( memento of the original from March 1, 2017 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.
