Solvay secret files
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Solvay secret files |
| Country of production | GDR |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1953 |
| length | 105 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Martin Hellberg |
| script |
Karl Georg Egel Richard Groschopp based on the radio play Das Hauptbuch der Solvays by Richard Groschopp |
| production | DEFA |
| music | Ernst Roters |
| camera | Eugen Klagemann |
| cut | Johanna Rosinski |
| occupation | |
| |
Secret files Solvay is a 1953 published Drama of DEFA director Martin Hellberg .
action
In the zonal border area at the beginning of the 1950s: since the division of Germany, there have been five soda factories on the GDR side, which once belonged to the major Solvay concern. In order to avoid complete expropriation, the top management has relocated its headquarters from Bernburg to Frankfurt am Main. The soda works are of considerable importance for the GDR economy, which is currently being built up, and so the country suffers some damage when some Solvay leaders stayed in the east to purposefully sabotage socialist company activity. One of the former bosses, Director Lütgen, was even able to establish himself as a trustee in the GDR plant branch. His destructive activities, which undermine the East German efforts, are extensive: he deliberately makes bad investments, suppresses urgently needed raw materials and ensures that part of the production reaches the west of Berlin via obscure routes.
An upright, party-loyal worker colleague named Hannes Lorenz is no longer willing to watch the destructive goings-on of this "arch-capitalist". For some time now, the locksmith has noticed that, despite the hard work, productivity in the factory is steadily falling. The unscrupulous Lütgen then plans to eliminate Lorenz. However, his murder attempt fails. With a few supporters who are loyal to the line, Lorenz can now stop the burrowing activity of the subversive capitalist servants and, last but not least, even prevent important documents, the "Solvay secret files", from being transported west. They document the close ties to the former IG Farben company at the time of the National Socialist dictatorship.
Production notes
The film was shot in 1952 according to allegedly true events about the Belgian Solvay group in the Babelsberg studio. The outdoor shots were taken in the VEB Sodawerk Staßfurt and Buchenau . Walter Jupé was a dramaturge. Walter Lehmann took over the production management. The film structures were designed by Artur Günther and executed by Willi Eplinius , Hans Minzloff and Hermann Asmus . Ernst Kunstmann did the trick photography. The film premiered on January 23, 1953 in East Berlin's Babylon Film Theater. Not shown in the West, however, Solvay's secret files could be seen from May 29, 1953 in Vienna, which was co-controlled by the Soviet Communists.
The 24-year-old actress Sigrid Roth made her film debut here with the part of Gerda Schramm.
The almost 50-year-old German-American Harro Tenbrook, who embodied the cliché of an American, earned fierce criticism in the Western press, such as the Spandauer Volksblatt , for his part in this film, which was rated as SED- propagandist .
Awards
Cinematographer Eugen Klagemann received the National Prize III. Class of the GDR for his oeuvre as a whole, with special mentioning of the films Semmelweis - Savior of Mothers , Figaro's Wedding and Solvay Secret Files .
Reviews
The SED press in the GDR celebrated the propaganda film:
"Secret files Solvay is a film that comes at the right moment to increase the vigilance of our working people and their revolutionary impact."
"For the first time in a DEFA film, worker figures are embodied here so simply and truthfully that our workers can identify with them."
The film criticism of democratic countries gave Solvay's secret files a more differentiated assessment :
"Factory sabotage in a soda factory in the eastern zone ... This is dealt with in a fairly exciting way with emphasis on the ideological background under fairly continuous direction with moderate interpreters in a real-time environment ..."
“A film made based on authentic events and highly topical in the year of its creation, which thematizes the transformation of a non-party worker and denounces the duplicity of economic experts. Since, according to the official opinion, the leading role of the party was not sufficiently expressed, the exciting, even if woodcut-like film in the design of the East-West conflict, was exposed to some reproaches. "
literature
- F.-B. Habel: The great lexicon of DEFA feature films. Page 196 f., Berlin 2001
- Alfred Bauer : German feature film Almanach. Volume 2: 1946–1955 , Filmbuchverlag Winterberg, Munich 1981, ISBN 3-921612-01-2
Web links
- Solvay secret files in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Solvay secret files at filmportal.de
- Solvay secret files at the DEFA Foundation
Individual evidence
- ↑ cf. Chewing gum in the cheek in Der Spiegel, issue 34/1955
- ↑ Solvay secret files. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .