Robert Reich (filmmaker)

Robert Reich (born June 18, 1882 in Prague ; † May 1944 in Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp ) was an Austrian filmmaker of Bohemian descent (film manager, cameraman , director , producer , production manager , screenwriter , film architect ), publicist and association official.

Work in the film industry

Shortly before the turn of the century, Reich had come to Vienna from Prague , where he attended the civil and commercial school. After several years as an employee and editor for a fashion journal, Reich first came into contact with film in 1909 when he was hired as head of advertising at the Apollo cinema in Vienna . In 1912, what would later become the most powerful film producer in the country, Alexander Graf Kolowrat , brought him and his production company Sascha-Film . During the First World War , Reich was employed as a cameraman in an air unit in Wiener Neustadt and in the Imperial and Royal War Press Headquarters.

In 1920 Reich founded the Austrian Film Service, which he headed until it was dissolved in 1925. Subsequently, until 1928, the native of Prague was appointed managing director of "Listo Filmfabrik Adolf Ambor". In the meantime, Reich had his first practical experience as a film architect ( clothes make the man ) and screenwriter ( The Marriage of One Night ). With the dawn of the sound film era, he again founded his own company, the “Österreichische Werbefilm Gesellschaft Reich & Co.”, with which he produced a series of short films. At the same time (1931) Robert Reich also directed feature films, the folk play Wiener Zauberklänge and the educational film From Midnight to Midnight , a commissioned production of the 'Austrian Central Office for Accident Prevention'. In 1933/34 he directed two cheerful short films with Hans Moser . His last practical film function was in 1936 as a production manager for the Opus film in the comedy of love and mistaken identity, Miss Lilli .

In those years, Reich primarily fulfilled his various obligations as an association official. At the beginning of the 1920s, Reich was a member of the board of the General Association of the Austrian Film Industry and also acted as its managing director from 1933 to 1938. He was also a member of the State Film Advisory Board and the censorship office of the City of Vienna.

Isolation, prison terms and deportations during the Nazi dictatorship

After Austria was annexed to the German Reich in March 1938, the Jewish film salesman quickly lost all of his posts and was no longer allowed to work as a producer. An attempt to leave Yugoslavia at the beginning of 1940 was unsuccessful, and in September of the same year Reich was arrested for alleged foreign exchange offenses and sentenced to ten months in prison. After his early release in July 1941, the Gestapo arrested Robert Reich on September 2, 1941. The charge this time: eavesdropping on enemy radio stations and disseminating foreign news information. For this offense, he received a five-month prison sentence on March 28, 1942.

On January 5, 1943 , German agencies deported Robert Reich to the Theresienstadt ghetto . On May 18, 1944, as part of a so-called "beautification and depopulation measure", the camp management there ordered Theresienstadt to be transferred to Auschwitz, where Reich was presumably gassed shortly after his arrival .

Movies

• 1913: How Ninette came to her exit (screenplay)
• 1921: Clothes make the man (film buildings)
• 1927: One Night's Marriage (script collaboration)
• 1930: Vienna (documentary film director)
• 1931: Viennese Magic Sounds (feature film direction, script collaboration)
• 1931: From midnight to midnight (feature film direction)
• 1933/34: The high C (short film director)
• 1934: Mayer at the dentist (short film director)
• 1936: Miss Lilli (production manager)

literature

• 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. 284.