Heinz Hanus

Heinz Hanus (born May 24, 1882 in Vienna , Austria-Hungary ; † March 16, 1972 in Bad Aussee , Austria ) was one of the first Austrian feature film directors and screenwriters in the silent era . Occasionally he also played small film roles.

Life

The son of a silk hat maker began his career as a pattern draftsman and designer of silk fabrics. He also played in private theater groups. He had to give up his first job because of paint poisoning. From then on he earned his living as a draftsman, including for the French embassy in Vienna under the architect GP Chédune, and from 1906 as a full-time theater actor. In 1909 he played the “bad student Züst” in “Goethe” alongside “Privy Councilor Goethe” Egon Friedell in the famous Viennese cabaret Fledermaus in Kärntner Strasse , which was furnished by artists from the Wiener Werkstätte .

It was also in 1907 when Hanus, according to his own statements, met the later director and producer Anton Kolm in the Viennese café “Dobner” . He asked the experienced actor Hanus to help him with his first production, “From Step to Step”. This film is said to have been released in Vienna cinemas in 1908 and, with a running time of 35 minutes, was the first full-length feature film in Austrian film history . But in contrast to the other productions of the time, there was not even a reference to a showing of this film in newspapers or in one of the two existing film magazines. And that although the film would have been a sensation with a length of 35 minutes. In spite of the greatest efforts, the Filmarchiv Austria was unable to find any other information - for example in the various other productions of the same name from that time - let alone find evidence of Hanus' remarks in the interviews from later decades.

Also because of the unusually long game length for this time, which would also have entailed a correspondingly high capital expenditure, where the alleged producer Anton Kolm notoriously struggled with a lack of capital in the later, proven productions of his first Austrian cinema industry founded in 1910 Strongly doubt assertion. Even decades later, Hanus was still able to describe the content of the film, a love story, exactly in interviews, and in a later production he exclusively "reenacted" a scene from the film, but this love story is a multiple filmed one anyway and well-known play.

Even without this production, Hanus was one of the pioneers of Austrian film . In addition to the film, he also worked as a theater director in many of the smaller cities of the monarchy . In 1922 he was the initiator and founding member of the Filmbund , an association of all interest groups for Austrian filmmakers.

He directed many of his films at the Vienna Astoria-Film . This was the only Austrian film company to have its own animation department. For some of the cartoons that were mixed with real feature film recordings, he directed the real recordings.

Contact with his brother Emmerich was limited. The two were in a contest rather than collaborative. After Heinz Hanus became a member of the NSDAP in 1938 and accepted the political interference of the National Socialists, personal contact decreased even further, since Emmerich did not want to be brought into the vicinity of National Socialist ideas.

His brother was the director Emmerich Hanus .

Filmography

• 1908: From level to level (existence of this film uncertain)
• 1910: Beard restorer
• 1913: King Menelaus in the cinema
• 1916: Vienna at war
• 1919: the idiot
• 1920: between 12 and 1
• 1920: How Satan died
• 1920: Under the knot of fate
• 1920: The golden spider
• 1920: The wrong path
• 1921: dwarf nose
• 1921: grim reaper. "Elixirs of Love"
• 1922: William Ratcliff
• 1922: Homo sum
• 1922: Fatme's salvation
• 1923: Beautiful wild world
• 1923: Pastorale
• 1924: St. Stephen's Cathedral
• 1924: The white paradise
• 1924: The German folk song in the film
• 1925: Women from the Vienna suburbs
• 1925: The marriageable doll
• 1925: The great People's Mayor Dr. Karl Lueger
• 1926: The arsonists of Europe. Colonel Redl's heirs
• 1927: The Rastel binder
• 1927: The waiter from the Münchnerhof
• 1928: Other women
• 1929: A radio dream
• 1930: In the theater agency
• 1932: Little Red Riding Hood
• 1932: Nocturno
• 1932: Children's Symphony
• 1932: Children's cabaret. I, II
• 1932: An unsuccessful love affair
• 1932: Peasant Symphony
• 1934: Csibi, the face

Web links

• Heinz Hanus at filmportal.de
• Heinz Hanus in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Audio recordings with Hans Hanus  in the online collections of the Austrian Mediathek (interview, radio feature)