Poste restante turtledove

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Movie
Original title Poste restante turtledove
Country of production Germany
original language German
Publishing year 1952
length 80 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Gerhard T. Buchholz
script Gerhard T. Buchholz
production Occident-Filmproduktion GmbH, Cologne
(Gerhard T. Buchholz)
music Hans-Martin Majewski
camera Peter Zeller
cut Gertrud Hinz
occupation

and Else Ehser , Ingolf Kuntze , Herbert Weißbach , Reinhold Pasch , Arthur Kistenmacher , Wilhelm Althaus , Alf Marholm , Otz Tollen , Ludwig Trautmann , Eva Krutina , Josef Kamper

Postlagernd Turteltaube is a German feature film from 1952 by Gerhard T. Buchholz , which provides a contribution to the Cold War from a Western perspective and which critically examines socialism . Barbara Rütting made her debut in front of the camera in this ensemble film.

action

The story takes place, without explicitly saying it, in the divided Germany of the early 1950s and symbolizes the division, the deep rift drawn by the ideologization of Eastern Europe, which not only runs through the country and the nation, but even through entire families. There is the free West, the still young Federal Republic , and there the unfree East, a state shaped by Stalinism and deeply ideologized, the GDR . Wolfgang Hartung and Lena Forche are part of these two extremes, which as antipodes are at the same time excellent representatives of both worldviews. Wolfgang and Lena are siblings and have not seen each other for years as a result of the war and the early post-war period. When they meet again for the first time, they not only meet as strangers, they appear to be two creatures from completely different planets: Hartung has become a devout SED - Aparatschik who firmly believes in his mission of the success of socialism, Lena in turn was in the shaped by the spirit of freedom and liberalism of the western powers over the past few years and is shocked by her brother's ideological blindness.

There is a dispute between the siblings: The unequal siblings agree on a daring experiment. Hartung is supposed to draft a letter and throw it in with the same word through every door mail slot of five tenants of "his" apartment building, which he also serves as a shop steward provided by the SED, loyal to the line. This letter is a very general, anonymous warning letter. Everything came out, it says heavily, and every letter reader should go to a certain address in the West as soon as possible, because there one would find out more under the code "Postlagernd Turteltaube". Wolfgang is firmly convinced that “his people” will be transformed into socialist people; he believes that no one will be fooled by such “temptation”: not the young teacher, not the press illustrator, a lousy blackmailer and informant , not even a university professor with a wife and mother-in-law or the dispossessed grocer with his wife and three sons and that's it not at all the fitter who has risen to become a people's judge . The belief in socialism as a better way of life compared to the temptations of the West will definitely prevail.

Lena Forche holds against it. She is convinced that even such a general warning letter will cause sheer panic among those addressed, regardless of whether someone is guilty of something, according to the socialist reading, or not. At a house meeting, despite all the insistent propaganda speeches and forced "voluntary" reports, she only observed fear and depression among those addressed. And it actually happens as Lena predicted: All letter recipients quickly pack their belongings and flee headlong to the West, where they will try to start a new life. Lena's western address becomes the collection point for "Postlagernd Turteltaube", and all "refugees from the republic " arrive there one after the other. Ultimately, even Hartung, the functionary, dragged by his own counterrevolutionary people, left the border, which was still open at the time, and flees, torn down, dirty and hungry, secretly back to his sister. His belief in socialism and the omnipotence of the party is certain of a new thoughtfulness. He and the other tenant house refugees can now start a new life without constant fear.

The inconspicuous East teacher Ilse Krüger, for example, who can no longer work in her old job in her new home country, starts a career as a mannequin in the West while the East Professor Gomoll has to start all over again in the West and make ends meet as a night watchman tried to come. In the art history lecture hall of a university, which is as dark as it is dark at night, he gives a ghostly mock lecture in wistful remembrance of his former self. "The film ends in a speech against fear," as Der Spiegel noted in 1952. “A refugee is holding them. He says he was always afraid, then of the block attendant, later of the headman. Because of this apotheosis Buchholz declared "Postlagernd Turteltaube" as a "comedy against fear". He dedicates it to the East as well as to the "sleepy West". "

Production notes

The shooting took place at the beginning of 1952 in a Wannsee villa in western Berlin that had been converted into a makeshift film studio. The outdoor shots were taken in Berlin-Wannsee and the surrounding area. Werner Drake took over the production management, Max Arthur Bienek designed the film structures. The original version of the film was first shown on the ii in June 1952 . To see Berlinale . In the amended version it was then shown in July 1952 at the Locarno Film Festival . The world premiere took place on July 29, 1952 a. a. in Düsseldorf and Cologne, the Berlin premiere was on May 29, 1953 in the Delphi cinema.

useful information

As director, author and producer Buchholz assured in “Spiegel”, he allegedly did not locate the film in Germany, but wanted to postulate a general statement: “We decided not to locate the film in a certain country. I don't say 'Halle' and not 'Düsseldorf'. "The trautonium , the only accompanying instrument in the film, only intones once" An der Saale bright beach "." And the misery in the east is by no means contrasted with a country in the west where milk and honey flow: “The people in the west are not at all rosy.”

Awards

  • The FBL awarded the film the title valuable .
  • The debutante Barbara Rütting received in 1953 in the category: Best Acting Achievement, Young Actress, for her first two film roles in Postlagernd Turteltaube and The track leads to Berlin the film tape in gold .

Reviews

Der Spiegel stated in 1952: "" Postlagernd Turteltaube ", the first anti-Eastern German feature film ... looks touchingly poor and awkwardcomparedto" Frauenschicksal ", the umpteen anti-Western feature film that started in the Eastern sector at the same time."

In Heinrich Fraenkel's "Immortal Film. The Great Chronicle. From the First Sound to the Colored Widescreen" one spoke of a "fooling of susceptibility to panic mood".

The film service ruled: “An attempt made with limited means of production to counter the commercial film of the 1950s with a political material that comically contrasts the fear in the GDR of the surveillance state and the complete carelessness in the Federal Republic. (...) Simple in the script, awkwardly staged, far better in photography and representation. Since the film is not convincing psychologically either, the discussion that was expected at the time did not take place. "

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Director Buchholz was obviously not at all convinced of Rütting's acting performance: He dictated to Spiegel (issue 24/1952) in the writing pad: "She can't do much, between us: she can do nothing",
  2. ↑ Poste restante Turteltaube in Der Spiegel from June 11, 1952
  3. ^ Alfred Bauer : German feature film Almanach. Volume 2: 1946–1955 , Filmbuchverlag Winterberg, Munich 1981, p. 288
  4. ↑ ibid.
  5. ↑ Poste restante turtledove in Der Spiegel 25/1952
  6. ↑ Immortal Film, p. 428, Munich 1957
  7. ↑ Poste restante turtledove. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed December 31, 2019 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 

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