Big city melody
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Big city melody |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1943 |
| length | 107 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Wolfgang Liebeneiner |
| script | Wolfgang Liebeneiner based on an idea by Else Feldbender and a manuscript by Géza von Cziffra and Astrid von dem Bussche |
| production | Heinrich Jonen (production group leader) for Berlin-Film |
| music |
Werner Bochmann Michael Jary Rudolf Perak |
| camera |
Walter Pindter (studio photos) Richard Angst (outdoor photos) Leo de Laforgue (outdoor photos) |
| cut | Marte Rau |
| occupation | |
and as a guest: Johannes Heesters as a revue star | |
Großstadtmelodie is a German feature film from 1943 with Hilde Krahl , Werner Hinz and Karl John in the leading roles. Wolfgang Liebeneiner's staging is of historical importance because it is considered the last film to show authentic shots of Berlin , which was previously undamaged .
action
Renate Heiberg lives in the sleepy Wasserburg am Inn and absolutely wants to make it big as a photographer. When one day an Italian pilot had to make an emergency landing in his plane, she saw her hour had come. Renate takes several photos that turn out to be excellent and seem to pave the way for her career. The reporter Rolf Bergmann put her in touch with a Berlin newspaper, which she sells the pictures. The photos appear on the title page and bring Renate 600 RM. Encouraged by this, the young woman takes the plunge to Berlin and tries to get a job with several editorial offices. But she is rebuffed one after the other. Only the Berolina-Press gives the young photographer a chance and hires her. Renate messes up her very first job; the required photos from a bike race arrive too late in the editorial department due to a misunderstanding and do not thematically meet the requirements. Renate is fired, but eventually meets his colleague Klaus Nolte, who has already made a name for himself as a press photographer. He supports Renate wherever he can and also helps her to find an apartment in Berlin.
Renate struggles to assert herself in her job. In order to stay afloat financially, she has to settle for less interesting odd jobs like photographing Tiergarten visitors. Klaus is at her side with advice and action and also provides her with films for her camera. Against all expectations, Renate hears again from the Berolina-Press: They have now found use for the cycling race photos they have already taken. Renate Heiberg is hired again and is given the task of taking a number of photos for a series of articles. When she meets Rolf Bergmann again at a fashion show, the two slowly get closer, and finally it sparks. However, Rolf has doubts that both jobs, which keep her on the move, are really conducive to a serious relationship. In fact, the two of them hardly see each other anymore: Bergmann complies with a foreign contract, and Renate takes photographs for an ambitious illustrated book about Berlin. When Rolf and Renate meet again, there is an argument and a subsequent separation. A little later, Klaus marries his fiancée, the revue dancer Viola. Renate and Rolf, who are present as witnesses at Klaus' request, reconcile at the celebration and decide to be the next to step in front of the altar.
Production notes
The shooting of this elaborately designed film dragged on for more than eight months. The shooting began on August 2, 1942 in Wasserburg am Inn and Berlin and the surrounding area. The studio recordings began in early October 1942 and ended in mid-April 1943. The premiere took place on October 4, 1943 in Berlin's Gloria-Palast and in the Palladium. On July 6, 1980, the film was shown on ZDF and thus for the first time on German television.
The production group leader of Berlin-Film , Heinrich Jonen , also took over the production management. The film structures were made by Karl Weber and Hermann Asmus , Walter Rühland provided the sound .
Peter Mosbacher made his debut in front of the camera in Großstadtmelodie , for Heinrich Schroth , who only had a very small scene here, the film became a farewell performance.
With a production cost of RM 2,645,000, Großstadtmelodie was a comparatively expensive film. By May 1944, however, it had already grossed 3,156,000 RM and was therefore considered a box office success.
Big city melody, advertised by the producing Berlin-Film as “a declaration of love to Berlin” and as a “modern romance from the abundance of everyday life in Berlin”, received the title “artistically valuable”. In June 1945 the film was banned for Germany by the Allied military authorities.
useful information
As Curt Riess ' memorabilia 'That's just once' reports, one of the two male leading actors, Karl John , is said to have caught himself in a lot of trouble with an open expression of opinion during or shortly after the filming. Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels had, according to Riess, summoned director Liebeneiner to himself and asked him about John. John, Goebbels told his most important confidante at the UFA, is said to have made a biting joke about Hitler during a tea party with a Swiss woman . Although von Goebbels urged to maintain secrecy, Liebeneiner, according to Riess, immediately informed John of his conversation with Goebbels, whereupon the latter, with the help of a doctor friend of his, faked or staged a serious accident. The same doctor then diagnosed John's skull base fracture and, after a few weeks in the hospital, had the actor admitted to a sanatorium to avoid possible arrest by the Gestapo . Another participant in this tea round, according to Riess, was John's colleague Robert Dorsay , who was executed that same year (1943) for expressing disrespect for the Nazi system.
Reviews
“The film hero Berlin is a dangerous partner; he easily plays everyone else against the wall. [...] Only a man with a special rhythm and a pronounced sense for rhythm and visual music, like Wolfgang Liebeneiner, could succeed in forcing the city melody into a symphonic unit. In addition to the presto clauses of intercourse, the allegro con brio of work, the molto vivace of sport, the scherzo is not missing either. The tender melody of love also sounds. [...] And in a poor studio, pain makes music on an abandoned soul. "
“ Big city melody in this respect could be described as a long overdue homage to the capital of the Reich, but it was also a film that not only followed previous modern city films in its portrayal, but also took a decisive step beyond these films. Because Liebeneiner's film shows the dynamic 'new' city from the perspective of a young woman who comes from the Bavarian provinces to the capital of the Reich to try her luck as a photographer. Until then rule the city with stories of male protagonists shown, it is in urban melody all traditional gender polarities despite a woman who city of Berlin becomes acquainted with their eyes or photographic camera, the viewer. This link, which is expressly underlined by the advertising poster to the film, suggests the question of whether the city melody could not only be an unusual modern city film, but also the paradox of a decidedly National Socialist emancipation film. "
“It was not easy to bring Berlin to life until 1939, because the war had left an irreversible mark. The film offered recordings of the capital that would not have been possible a few weeks later (therefore it also had documentary value). "
"The film made before the destruction of Berlin, with prominent cast (with the hit" Berlin - I'm in love with you day and night ") shows the old capital in all its splendor."
See also
Individual evidence
- ↑ See Ulrich J. Klaus: Deutsche Tonfilme, Volume 12, born in 1942/43. Berlin 2001, p. 158 f.
- ↑ Irina Scheidgen: National Socialist Modernism? Femininity and the city in Nazi films; in: Harro Segeberg (ed.): Mediale Mobilmachung I, The Third Reich and the Film
- ↑ “Do you know, gentlemen, what will happen to Hitler after the war? It is led across Germany on a chain with a collection box from the Winter Relief Organization. Everyone can spit on him. Spitting at one time costs a mark! "
- ↑ Riess: There's only one available. The book of German film after 1945, Hamburg 1958. P. 102 f.
Web links
- Melody of a Great City in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Big city melody at filmportal.de
- Großstadtmelodie Complete uncut film at the Deutsche Filmothek