Olympic film

Team of Olympia-Film GmbH during a shoot for the film about the Summer Olympics in Berlin in 1936 , Leni Riefenstahl on the right , Walter Frentz next to her cameraman on the left

The Olympic-Film GmbH was a German company based in Berlin , whose major business purpose the production of the film about the Olympic Games was in Berlin in the year 1936th

Establishment and liquidation

Partial view of the Geyer Werke AG building in Berlin's Alt-Treptow district , Harzerstraße 39, 1935–1939 also the seat of Olympia-Film GmbH

Team of Olympic-Film GmbH during a working meeting on the Maifeld the Olympic Stadium in Berlin in the summer of 1936. In the center director Leni Riefenstahl and cameraman Walter Frentz

Back cover (cover page 4) of the TOBIS rental brochure for the Riefenstahl film about the 1936 Olympics with the logo and address of Olympia-Film GmbH (center)

Olympia-Film GmbH was founded on December 9, 1935 . The shareholders were the siblings Heinz Riefenstahl and Leni Riefenstahl . The seat of the company was the address Harzerstraße 39 in Berlin SO 36 ( Alt-Treptow ), which was also the address of Geyer-Werke AG , a film copier, which was already active there . The investment capital of Olympia-Film GmbH in the amount of 20,000 Reichsmarks was provided jointly by Heinz and Leni Riefenstahl, Heinz with 2,000 RM, Leni with 18,000 RM.

The Olympic-Film GmbH was dissolved at 31 December 1939 and liquidated on January 9 1,942th

background

The Olympic-Film GmbH was a camouflage against the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the international community, a front company, because in reality that of was Joseph Goebbels led Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda (RMVP) behind it, a fact that should be veiled.

The Ministerialrat Karl Ott , responsible for the RMVP, formulated this to the Berlin-Charlottenburg District Court about five weeks after the company was founded: “The company must be founded because the Reich does not want to appear as the producer of the film. The Olympic-Film GmbH was founded on the initiative of the empire with agents of the empire. The funds required by the company for the production of the film are also all provided in the Reich budget. It is envisaged that the company will be liquidated after the business relating to the production of the film has been completed. "

Customers or clients

The official film about the 1936 Summer Olympics was commissioned by Reich Minister Joseph Goebbels just one day after the establishment of Olympia-Film GmbH , which is a clear indication that corresponding agreements must have been made in advance. In addition, before production started, UFA assumed a distribution guarantee for the planned film, for which TOBIS Film-Verleih GmbH , which was incorporated into UFA, was later responsible.

As Generalbauinspektor (GBI) for the capital handed Albert Speer the Olympia-Film GmbH from his official residence on Pariser Platz from repeated orders for documentaries.

financing

The Olympic-Film GmbH mastered during their business activities solely for the two-part Olympic film a budget of 1.5 million Reichsmark initially, to 1937 increased to more than 2.8 million RM. The company did not generate the money, however, but received it from the state budget through the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda.

Filmography (excerpt)

Olympia-Film GmbH is responsible for producing the following films :

• Mountain farmers , 1940
• Hochalm , 1939/40
• The greatest happiness on earth on horseback , 1939
• Power and swing - the basic elements of gymnastics , 1939
• Running , 1940
• Funny argument in the swimming stadium between Franz, Orje and Frollein , 1939
• The film from the XI. Olympic Games Berlin 1936 (2 separate parts), 1936–1938
  • Part 1: Festival of the Nations , 1936–1938
  • Part 2: Festival of Beauty , 1936–1938
• Easter ski tour in Tyrol , 1939
• All about the Olympic Games , feature film, 1937
• Swimming and jumping , 1940
• The jump , 1940
• Whitewater , 1938/39
• The Litter in Sport - Considerations for Friends of Sport , 1938/39

Known employees (excerpt)

The number of employees rose from around 130 to around 300 at times.

Andor from Barsy Wilfried Basse Konstantin Boenisch Wolfgang Brüning Josef Dietze Edmund Epkens Hans Ertl Rudolf Fichtner Walter Frentz Fritz von Friedl Hans Karl Gottschalk Arthur Grimm Walter Gronostay Richard Groschopp Walter Groskopf Willy Hameister Wolf Hart

Hasso Hartnagel Walter Hege Robert Herlth Eberhard von der Heyden Arnfried Heyne Albert Höcht Paul Holzki Werner Hundhausen Heinz von Jaworsky Hugo von Kaweczynski Herbert Kebelmann Sepp Ketterer Arthur Kiekebusch Wolfgang Kiepenheuer Albert Kling Ernst Kunstmann Leo de Laforgue

Alexander of Lagorio Edoardo Lamberti Rolf Lantin Guzzi Lantschner Otto Lantschner Paul Laven Waldemar Lembke Georg Lemki CA Left Johannes Lüdke Max Michel Henri Nannen Kurt Neubert Erich Nitzschmann Svend Noldan Johannes Pagels Harald Reinl

Albert Schattmann Hans Scheib Wilhelm Schmidt Josef Schmücker Hugo O. Schulze Leo Schwedler Alfred Siegert Wilhelm Georg Siehm Serious concern Elli Sougioultzoglou-Seraidari Helmuth von Stwolinski Walter Traut Károly Vass Rolf Wernicke Herbert Windt Willy Zielke

See also

• List of German film production companies
• National Socialist Film Policy
• German film history

Web links

• Olympia Film GmbH in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Olympiad: Olympic Documentaries . In: Lexicon of film terms, on: uni-kiel.de

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Peter Nowotny: Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph des Willens - On the Critique of Documentary Film Work in Nazi Fascism . (= Workbooks on media theory and media practice, vol. 3). Dortmund 1981, p. 47ff.
2. ↑ Julika Funk, Cornelia Brück: body concepts . Gunter Narr Verlag, Tübingen 1999. ISBN 978-3-8233-5704-9 , p. 69.
3. ^ Cooper C. Graham: Leni Riefenstahl and Olympia . Scarecrow Press 1986. ISBN 978-0-8108-3961-8 , p. 30.
4. ^ Rainer Rother: Leni Riefenstahl - The Seduction of Genius . Bloomsbury Publishing, London et al. 2003. ISBN 978-0-8264-7023-2 , pp. 83, 154.
5. ^ Daniel Wildmann: Desired body - construction and staging of the Aryan male body in the Third Reich . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 1998. ISBN 978-3-8260-1417-8 , p. 30.
6. ↑ ^{a b} Peter V. Brinkemper: Leni Riefenstahl's 100th legacy for Hollywood . In: Telepolis of August 22, 2002, on: heise.de
7. ^ Jürgen Trimborn : Riefenstahl - A German career. Biography. Aufbau-Verlag , Berlin 2002. ISBN 978-3-3510-2536-6 , p. 563.
8. ↑ Letter from Dr. Karl Ott, Ministerialrat in the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, dated January 30, 1936, to the Berlin-Charlottenburg District Court
9. ^ Hanns-Georg Rodek : How Gerhard Schröder sold Leni Riefenstahl . In: Die Welt from April 22, 2013, on: welt.de
10. ↑ Timo Fuchs: Olympics 1936 - your portrayal in the films "Festival of Beauty" and "Festival of the Nations" - an analysis under the aspect of the relationship between documentation and fictionality . Diploma thesis, University of Hildesheim , Department of Media 2004. Grin Verlag, Munich 2004. ISBN 978-3-6387-2675-7 .
11. ↑ Jens Monath: Leni Riefenstahl - The price of fame . In: ZDF History, on: PHOENIX, March 24, 2018
12. ^ Jürgen Trimborn: Riefenstahl - A German career. Biography. Aufbau-Verlag , Berlin 2002. ISBN 978-3-3510-2536-6 , p. 262.
13. ^ Olympia-Film GmbH , on: worldcat.org
14. ^ Olympia-Film GmbH (Berlin) , on: filmportal.de
15. ↑ Konstantin Boenisch , on: filmportal.de
16. ^ Wolfgang Brüning , on: filmportal.de
17. ↑ Leni Riefenstahl engaged Elfriede's brother . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung of August 6, 2014, on: sueddeutsche.de
18. ↑ Edmund Epkens , on: filmportal.de
19. ↑ Walter Groskopf , on: imdb.com
20. ↑ Wolf Hart , on: filmportal.de
21. ^ Hasso Hartnagel , on filmportal.de
22. ↑ Eberhard von der Heyden , on: filmportal.de
23. ↑ Werner Hundhausen , on: filmportal.de
24. ^ Arthur Kiekebusch , on: filmportal.de
25. ↑ Wolfgang Kiepenheuer , on: filmportal.de
26. ^ Albert Kling , on: filmportal.de
27. ↑ Waldemar Lembke , on filmportal.de
28. ↑ George Lemki , on filmportal.de
29. ↑ CA Linke , on: filmportal.de
30. ^ Johannes Lüdke , on: filmportal.de
31. ↑ Johannes Pagels , on: filmportal.de
32. ^ Wilhelm Schmidt , on: filmportal.de
33. ^ Josef Schmücker , on: filmportal.de
34. ^ Alfred Siegert , on: filmportal.de
35. ↑ William George Siehm , on filmportal.de
36. ↑ Marc Schlage: Sport as War - War as Sport: Mechanisms for the Emotional Conditioning of People in National Socialism - An Investigation Using the Example of Sports Socialization, Olympic Film and Newsreel, Inaugural Dissertation, Europa-Universität Flensburg, March 2013, pp. 455–456. (PDF file; 111 KB)
37. ↑ Olympia (2 parts) , on: filmportal.de