Paracelsus (film)

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Movie
Original title Paracelsus
Paracelsus 1943 Logo 001.svg
Country of production Germany
original language German
Publishing year 1943
length 106 (1943), 97 (1959) minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director GW Pabst
script Kurt Heuser
production Fred Lyssa for Bavaria Filmkunst GmbH
music Herbert Windt
camera Bruno Stephan
cut Lena Neumann
occupation

Paracelsus is a 1942 film directed by GW Pabst . The focus of the action is the doctor and alchemist Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim , played by Werner Krauss .

action

Central Europe at the beginning of the 16th century. The Basel doctor Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, known as Paracelsus, who traveled across the country , stopped in a free imperial city. His healing methods, forerunners of holistic medicine , are suspect and a thorn in the side of his medical colleagues. Because unlike these, for whom the medical teachings of the faculties are sacred and irrevocable law, he develops his own theories in medicine that are based on practical experience, research and knowledge. For him, the human being as a whole is in the foreground of his observations and analyzes, and Paracelsus can boast considerable success in the late Middle Ages with the treatment methods that resulted from this.

When he succeeds in healing the bookseller Froben, who has been abandoned by all doctors, his teaching is on everyone's lips. The people respect and value him, and accordingly the number of his enemies among the conventionally practicing medicine is increasing rapidly. This also includes the merchant Pfefferkorn: he resents Paracelsus for having the city gates closed for reasons of epidemic protection in order to prevent the impending arrival of the plague . Envy and resentment strike Paracelsus more and more, his powerful opponents accuse him of charlatanry . Above all, the hitherto leading physician in the imperial city, the Magister, who just wanted to amputate poor Froben's leg before Paracelsus could intervene and save him from the backward quack, is maturing into his worst enemy. Because after this success Paracelsus replaced the Magister in his position.

It was only too convenient for his adversaries that Paracelsus 'closest colleague, the ambitious Famulus Johannes, used an as yet untested elixir of his teacher in an unauthorized attempt at healing without Paracelsus' knowledge. Froben, who was treated with it, fell ill again, and died as a result. Paracelsus' adversaries now see their chance to get rid of the hated colleague once and for all. They have the innocent doctor locked up, even if Paracelsus has long been regarded as a savior by the common people, the urban population. With the help of the juggler tibial, who is one of the successfully treated Paracelsus patients, the misunderstood doctor can escape prison. Paracelsus goes on a journey again and heals from now on, living in all modesty, the sick people he meets on his travels. Paracelsus even turned down an offer from the emperor to come to his court as a personal physician. From now on he only wanted to serve the common people.

Production notes

On the occasion of the 400th anniversary of Paracelsus' death in 1941, the state ordered the creation of a major film biography a little later. This was preceded by numerous festive events and literary publications in honor of the Swiss doctor in the same year.

Filming of Paracelsus began on July 7, 1942 and ended in early November of the same year. The film was shot in the Barrandov studios in Prague .

Since Paracelsus died in Salzburg, the premiere of the film took place on March 12, 1943 in the hall of the Salzburg Festival Hall. Up until now, only Karl Hartl's Mozart film Who the Gods Love had premiered there. The Bavaria boss Helmut Schreiber gave a short speech. Director Pabst and some of the leading actors were also present.

The Berlin premiere of Paracelsus took place on May 6, 1943.

After the film was accepted by the censors, Paracelsus received the Nazi rating of 'State-politically and artistically valuable'.

The film stands in the tradition of various other large-scale productions of the Third Reich, with which especially between 1939 and 1943 larger-than-life personalities of Central European history from politics, art and science should be paid homage. These include Robert Koch, the fighter of death , Friedrich Schiller - The Triumph of a Genius , Bismarck , The Great King , Ohm Krüger , Rembrandt and Andreas Schlueter . The intention behind these, as a rule, very expensive and laboriously produced and top-class film biographies was a political one: the aim was to create an analogy to Adolf Hitler and his "genius" claimed by Nazi propaganda. The title characters of these films were always "larger than life" and the mediocre opponents - in Paracelsus it were councilors, the Magister and other rival doctors - far superior visionaries who stand up against all odds, especially in the hard fight against the small minds around them , Complainers and envious people.

The expressive dancer Harald Kreutzberg appeared here for the first time in a feature film.

The backdrops are by Herbert Hochreiter and Walter Schlick, the costumes were designed by Herbert Ploberger .

The production costs amounted to about 2,709,000 million Reichsmarks. With revenues of RM 3.5 million by January 1945, the film was considered a box office flop.

At the first post-war showing in 1959, the film was cut from 106 to 97 minutes. The German-French cultural channel arte broadcast a 99-minute version on January 16, 2001. The film has the same length on the DVD, which was released on October 11, 2013.

criticism

The lexicon of the international film wrote about Paracelsus : “Georg Wilhelm Pabst [...] had to make concessions to the Nazi state with this film, especially in pathetic expressions that were put in the mouth of the knight Ulrich von Hutten. Suggestive crowd scenes with hysteria of fear and superstition conjure up a 'dark middle ages'. "

The film's large lexicon of people pointed to the historical context of Paracelsus and the importance of the Pope's staging in National Socialist filmmaking: “His atmospheric work“ Paracelsus ”(reinterpreted by the Nazis for their purposes) from this period deserves attention The Middle Ages described as a gloomy epoch, determined by superstition and small-mindedness, in which a larger-than-life plague miracle healer, a classic leader figure, was prevented from carrying out his work by envious and charlatans who do not know how to recognize his importance as a great visionary Court should be brought. "

Drewniaks The German Film 1938–1945 also placed this political-historical aspect in the foreground when viewing the film. There it says: “From a purely political point of view, that was a convenient topic for the Nazi film: the validity on a large scale, leader ideals and last but not least the 'Greater German' idea, which was also extended to the country of the Confederates”.

Reclam's film guide judged: “Here Pabst conjured up the Middle Ages in suggestive crowd scenes as a world of superstition and dark entanglements. The horror, the fear of the plague become particularly clear in the scenes in which Harald Kreutzberg interprets the fear of death with dance. On the opposite side stands the larger-than-life figure of the miracle worker who drives away petty hostility. "

As Heinrich Fraenkel reports in his work Immortal Film, director Pabst is said to have not been satisfied with his own work. Fraenkel, who returned from exile, reports on an encounter with the director after the war. “I told him that , despite Werner Krauss, I didn't like his Paracelsus . "Neither do me," the director explained with a smile. "

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See Ulrich J. Klaus: Deutsche Tonfilme, Volume 12, born in 1942/43. Berlin 2001, p. 203 f.
  2. ↑ Klaus Brüne (Red.): Lexikon des Internationale Films Volume 6, S. 2884. Reinbek near Hamburg 1987.
  3. ↑ Kay Less : The film's great personal dictionary . The actors, directors, cameramen, producers, composers, screenwriters, film architects, outfitters, costume designers, editors, sound engineers, make-up artists and special effects designers of the 20th century. Volume 6: N - R. Mary Nolan - Meg Ryan. Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-89602-340-3 , p. 105.
  4. ^ Bogusław Drewniak: The German Film 1938–1945. A complete overview. Düsseldorf 1987, p. 204
  5. ^ Reclam's film guide. By Dieter Krusche, collaboration with Jürgen Labenski. Stuttgart 1973, p. 459.
  6. ↑ Fraenkel: Immortal Film. The big chronicle from the first note to the colored wide screen. Munich 1957, p. 132.

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