Mazurka (1935)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | mazurka |
| Country of production | Germany |
| original language | German |
| Publishing year | 1935 |
| length | 94 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 12 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Willi Forst |
| script | Hans Rameau |
| production | Cine Alliance (Berlin) |
| music |
Peter Kreuder using compositions by Carl Millöckers |
| camera | Konstantin Irmen-Tschet |
| cut | Hans Wolff |
| occupation | |
| |
Mazurka is a German feature film from 1935 directed by Willi Forst with Pola Negri in the leading role.
action
The young Lisa Petrovna and her friend Hilde attend a concert by the composer Grigory Michailow. Meanwhile, a letter is handed to her in which Mikhailov asks her to speak to her after the concert. Mikhailov speaks to her and then invites her to visit a locality. There the chansonette Vera Petrovna appears, who faints after seeing Mikhailov in the audience. Conscious again, she pulls out a revolver and shoots twice at the artist, who eventually collapses when hit. Then the singer is arrested. It comes to trial. Vera decides to make use of the right to refuse to testify. Only when a suitcase taken from a locker is brought into the courtroom as evidence does she change her attitude. She is ready to testify, but only in camera and on the condition that the suitcase remains locked. The judge approves of this deal.
Flashback: Vera talks about her life. She sang at the Warsaw Opera before she married the handsome and gallant Rittmeister Boris Kierow. In order to devote herself fully to her marriage and their small child, she wanted to give her farewell performance in “Mazurka”, an opera written by the young composer Grigory Michailow. While her husband had to go to the field in 1914, Vera stayed at home with her young daughter. In a company of former artist colleagues Vera apparently drank too much, at least she woke up the next morning in Mikhailov's apartment. Apparently the man had mercilessly exploited her state of alcoholism and seduced Vera. She escaped from Mikhailov's apartment and returned to the house where her husband had just returned from the front. Mikhailov did not give up and continued to bother Vera with his desires for amorous satisfaction. To ask him to finally let go of her, Vera went to Grigory's apartment one last time, but was watched by her husband, who then filed for divorce. After their separation, the father got the daughter.
Vera then returned to her job and from then on only appeared in third-class bars and pubs. It was 15 long years before she could see her daughter again for the first time. Her ex-husband, who had since died, had since remarried. Lisa grew up believing that the second wife, Kierow, was her mother. Vera decided not to overwhelm her child and left it in this delusion. But then she saw her child accompanied by this hated man and shot. Now the locker case has to be opened and documents are taken from it that fully confirm Vera's statements. During the proceedings it turns out that Vera wanted to spare her child their own fate, namely to fall into the clutches of the unscrupulous seducer Mikhailov. The verdict is therefore comparatively mild with three years in prison. When a petition for clemency is granted, Vera is de facto at large. In front of the courtroom there is an encounter between mother and birth daughter who still does not know the truth. Lisa wishes Vera the best of luck, then the young woman leaves the building with her foster mother.
Production notes
Mazurka was shot mostly from mid-January to the end of March 1935, with follow-ups made at the end of October of the same year. After the censorship decisions of November 12th and 13th, 1935, the film was released for an audience of 14 years and older and given the title "artistically valuable". The premiere took place on November 14, 1935 in the Berlin Capitol.
Fritz Klotzsch took over the production management, Walter Lehmann the production management . The buildings are by Hermann Warm and Carl Haacker . The participation of the Jewish screenwriter Hans Rameau in year 3 of the National Socialist "Thousand Years Reich" is remarkable . The previous owners of the producing Cine Allianz, the Jews Arnold Pressburger and Gregor Rabinowitsch , had been forced out of their own company shortly before shooting began as part of an aryanization measure.
For Pola Negri, Mazurka meant returning to Germany after twelve years of absence. Forst's production was a huge public and box office success, whereupon the Pole stayed in Berlin for five more films until the end of 1938. Only then did she leave the country forever. Negri, endowed with a deep voice, sang her parts only in the lower range. The high notes were intoned by Hilde Seipp .
The young up-and-coming artist Ingeborg Theek, who had made her film debut here and played Pola Negri's daughter, fell ill with an infection during the filming that temporarily paralyzed her. As a result, she had to be put in a wheelchair for the final scene, which was pulled through the studio, invisible to the audience.
The film was taken into his private archive at Berghof by Adolf Hitler, a declared Negri fan.
In 1937 Joe May directed a remake in Hollywood under the title Confession .
Reviews
“In a genre that is completely different from his previous films, Willy [sic] Forst proves to be the virtuoso ruler of the art of staging. He has created a film that is reliable in the truest sense of the word and whose overwhelming impression cannot be resisted. "
“'Mazurka' is wonderful in the way it builds up tension and is wonderful in acting. This film is tasteful and skillful. Perhaps too skillfully - with the head and a minimum of heart. This is the only objection to this mastery of cinematic culture [...]. The Negri is an experience. Forst's [sic] new discovery, Ingeborg Theek, appears to Garbo - beautiful and unaffected girlish; it remains to be seen whether it is enough if her nature does not match the role. [.] The Kinz simple and discreet. This director is undisputedly at the forefront of German filmmakers. "
“Refined direction gives a plot with tension effects to a remarkable level. Amalgamated, except for a slackening at the beginning of the narrative box story in constant increase, criminal with emotional. The Negri very large, moving; unobtrusive, memorable individual performances. Interiors that match the milieu, plenty of background music (Kreuder). "
"Conventional plot and camera work, but careful, condensing direction and strong acting."
See also
Web links
- Mazurka in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Mazurka at filmportal.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ Ulrich J. Klaus: Deutsche Tonfilme 6th year 1935. P. 141 (082.35), Berlin 1995
- ↑ ibid.
- ↑ Kay Less : Between the stage and the barracks. Lexicon of persecuted theater, film and music artists from 1933 to 1945 . With a foreword by Paul Spiegel . Metropol, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-938690-10-9 , p. 15.
- ↑ Boguslaw Drewniak's “The German Film 1938–1945”, a complete overview. Düsseldorf 1987, p. 632
- ↑ Österreichische Film-Zeitung , No. 47, November 22, 1935, page 6.
- ↑ Pem : Sharply seen - but correct. Three one-offs - Negri, Robson, Mardayn. In: Der Morgen - Wiener Montagblatt , December 23, 1935, p. 11.
- ↑ Mazurka in Paimann's film lists ( memento of the original from April 3, 2016 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.
- ↑ Mazurka. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .
