Port Arthur (film)

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Movie
Original title Port Arthur
Country of production Czechoslovakia
France
original language German
Publishing year 1936
length 81 minutes
Rod
Director Nikolaus Farkas
Josef Gielen (dialogue director)
script Kurt Heuser
Hans Klaehr
production Pierre O'Cornell (overall management) for Slavia-Film, Prague, and FCL Films, Paris
music Ottokar Jeremias
camera Georg Krause
cut Roger from Norman
occupation

and also in small roles Karl Meixner , Karl Morvilius , Erich Nadler , Theodor Rocholl , Wilhelm H. König , Hermann Mayer-Falkow , Hellmuth Passarge , Youngling Tschang , Georg Volker

Port Arthur is a 1936 adventure film shot in German and French with Adolf Wohlbrück in the leading role. The director was the Hungarian Nikolaus Farkas , who became known as a cameraman .

action

1904, at the time of the Russo-Japanese War . The massive army of the Russian commander-in-chief in the Far East, General Kuropatkin , has been defeated, and Admiral Makarov's fleet has been destroyed. Port Arthur , the port city on the Chinese coast, is besieged by the Japanese. One of the remaining Russian occupiers is the officer Boris Ranewsky, commander of a torpedo boat, who stubbornly perseveres with his men. He and his men should keep the fortress as long as possible. He is also in an extremely difficult situation in his private life: his wife Youki is Japanese, his brother-in-law Ivamoura is a fanatical Japanese nationalist and officer, who from the start intrigued against his sister's marriage to the Russian shortly before the outbreak of hostilities.

Meanwhile, Ivamoura, disguised as a Chinese coolie, tries to penetrate the Russian fortress with the help of youkis. He appeals to her patriotic duty as a Japanese woman when he demands her help in his espionage activities. She should find out when the sad remnant of the once proud Russian fleet will try to break out of Port Arthur. Out of loyalty to her husband, she refuses to comply with Ivamoura's request and brusquely rejects his request. When Boris returns after six weeks of service at the front, she asks him urgently to tell her whether the Russians want to attempt an escape. Boris doesn't know anything, but is all the more astonished when a little later he learns from General Staff Officer Captain Novitzki that a breakthrough attempt is actually being planned. Who could have told Youki about it?

Soon afterwards Boris receives a delicate and dangerous assignment from the head of the Russian counter-espionage, Captain Vossidlow. They intercepted a Japanese carrier pigeon and learned that a Japanese spy ring was up to mischief in Port Arthur. Ranewsky should therefore comb Port Arthur with his men for enemy spies. Before that, however, Wossidlow invites himself to tea at Ranewsky's to get to know his Japanese wife better and to get to know her. Boris, who has a bad feeling, is now urging Youki to tell him where she got the information about the upcoming outbreak of the fleet. In the end she confesses the truth to him and names her brother, but just as clearly asserts that she will not make common cause with him or the Japanese.

The Chinese owner of the tea house, where Youki and her brother met, is willing to cooperate with the Russians for a substantial sum. It is hoped to lure Ivamoura or other Japanese agents back there and arrest them in unison. While Boris makes the deal in the tea house perfect, Wossidlow puts Youki under such pressure during a chat with Youki that she confesses to the betrayal she never committed to the Russian. In order to spare Boris Ranewsky the disgrace of having taken a Japanese spy as his wife, Wossidlow even tries to induce her to commit suicide. Boris arrives at the last moment and makes it clear to Wossidlow that his suspicions are on the wrong track. When she leaves the room, swearing that she is no longer in any relationship with her brother, a figure stands across from her in the darkness of the next room: it is Ivamoura.

He hid there on the run from the Russians, whose raid completely startled the city, and now asks his sister for help. She refuses his request and, when he is not ready to go, first refers him to her husband's study. Ivamoura seized the opportunity there and copied important military documents from the fortress. When Youki tries to intervene, her brother threatens to shoot her husband immediately if she utters a single peep. Right next door, Wossidlow and Boris got together with the tea house owner for a conspiratorial meeting about the Japanese spies who will soon meet at a rendezvous. Ivamoura sees everything and at the last moment can warn his people about the Russian trap.

The Russian plans are passed on to the Japanese besiegers, and Ivamoura settles accounts with the tea house owner who runs a treacherous double game. Boris Ranewsky arrests his brother-in-law on his body. Ivamoura's plea for an honorable suicide and to spare Youki the shame of betrayal causes Boris' blood to freeze. So did his wife lie and collaborate with the Japanese? He is stunned. Although he has to accept that this will extradite his wife to Russian jurisdiction, Boris obeys his soldierly oath and hands Ivamoura over to the Russian counter-espionage. The plans of Fort II copied by Ivamoura have resulted in the Japanese cannon fire gradually wearing down the fortress defenders. The defeat of the remaining Russian garrison seems only a matter of hours. Boris receives the order, with the flags of the Russian regiments on board, to break through the Japanese blockade ring with his torpedo boat in order to at least save the Russian honor.

Meanwhile, Captain Wossidlow insists on subjecting Youki and her brother to another sharp interrogation. Ivamoura has only one wish: he wants to take off his shabby camouflage clothes and be honored in his Japanese officer's uniform. Youki, on the other hand, is to be brought to court martial, her betrayal seems proven. Boris has now also lost faith in his wife's sincerity. Since the remaining Russians are about to surrender, the executions are suspended and Youki is released from custody. She then runs into town to look for her husband in Port Arthur and explain everything to him. Both find each other again on the torpedo boat. Boris fails in his attempt to break through the Japanese ring. But at least the regimental flags shouldn't get into Japanese hands, and so Captain Ranewsky gave the order to open all bulkheads and flood the ship. At the moment of their death, the Russian and his Japanese wife embrace - exactly in the place where they were once married: in the officers' mess.

Production notes

Port Arthur , based on a novel by Pierre Frondaie, was produced as a Czech-French co-production in the Barrandov studios in Prague from mid-August 1936 until well into September . However, the film was not produced in any Czech version, but only received a German and a French version. The German version was premiered on December 7, 1936 in Berlin's Ufa-Palast am Zoo and also opened in Prague on January 22, 1937. The French version, which Wohlbrück advertised as "Adolphe Wohlbruck", premiered in Paris on December 11, 1936 and was shown for the first time in Prague on January 15, 1937. The German film Christmas 1936 was shown in Austria (Vienna).

While the German version only included employees who were agreeable to the Nazi regime, the French version also included filmmakers who had fled Hitler's Germany. Sun joined Otto Heller there as one of the two cameramen in appearance, and Arnold Lippschütz participated in the French script. As with Adolf Wohlbrück's previous international adventure film Der Kurier des Zaren , the Frenchman Pierre O'Connell was in charge of the overall direction of Port Arthur and the German Walter Guse was in charge of production. The Russian exiled film architects Ivan Lochakoff and Vladimir Meingard, who were also involved in the tsar's courier , also designed the buildings for Port Arthur .

Traveled immediately after the shooting actor Wohlbrück, to Port Arthur , the last German language film should be in front of his exile, the end of September 1936 in the US in order there in the remake of his great audience acclaim Michael Strogoff , The Soldier and the Lady , again to play Michael Strogoff.

Reviews

The contemporary, German-language reviews discussed the film with some pathos. Below is a small selection:

According to the opinion of the Berlin premiere, the Neue Wiener Journal wrote on page 19 in its edition of December 8, 1936: "The grandiose battle pictures are an effective background for the impressive acting achievements of Adolf Wohlbrück and Paul Hartmann, who still consider Karin Hardt to be the little one Japanese woman joined. "

In the issue of December 8, 1936, page 10 of the News-Welt-Blatt read: "Love and espionage, relentless war skills and heroic sacrificial death give this film a noteworthy character, especially since a largely masterful presentation to grab the audience and the female In many cases, moviegoers even know how to move them to tears. "

In the edition of January 1, 1937, on page 7 of the Austrian Film-Zeitung, “The sensational film drama” Port Arthur was announced with some advertising: “A film full of excitement and passion. A film staged with special effort."

The lexicon of international film judged more factually after the war: not uninteresting war film - with the nationalist pathos of the thirties - about the fighting between the Russians and Japanese in 1904/05 over the fortress Port Arthur, which fell to the better spying Japanese. [...] The well-played film is full to the brim with fame phrases about the honor of a soldier and the fulfillment of duty.

Individual evidence

  1. Kay Less : "In life, more is taken from you than given ...". Lexicon of filmmakers who emigrated from Germany and Austria between 1933 and 1945. A general overview. ACABUS Verlag, Hamburg 2011, ISBN 978-3-86282-049-8 , p. 662.
  2. "Port Arthur". In:  Neues Wiener Journal , December 8, 1936, p. 19 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / nwj
  3. "Port Arthur". In:  Neuigkeits-Welt-Blatt , December 8, 1936, p. 10 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / nwb
  4. "Port Arthur". In:  Österreichische Film-Zeitung , January 1, 1937, p. 7 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / fil
  5. Klaus Brüne (Red.): Lexikon des Internationale Films, Volume 6, S. 2979. Reinbek near Hamburg 1987.

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