Romeo and Juliet (1912)

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Movie
German title Romeo and Juliet
Original title Romeo e Giulietta
Country of production Italy , France
original language Italian
Publishing year 1912
length 725 meters, at 17 fps 37 minutes
Rod
Director Ugo Falena
script Augusto Genina , after William Shakespeare
production Film d'Arte Italiana , SA Pathé Frères
camera Ugo Falena
occupation

Romeo and Juliet is the German title of the Italian silent film drama Romeo e Giulietta , which Ugo Falena made as an Italian-French co-production in 1911 based on a screenplay written by Augusto Genina based on the tragedy of the same name by William Shakespeare . The role of Giulietta was taken on by actress Francesca Bertini , who is considered the 'diva of early Italian film' . As Romeo, Gustavo Serena was seen in his first film role.

The Film d'Arte Italiana , founded in 1909 , specialized entirely in costume films. From Pathè Frères the Schablonenkolorier process was developed, which was used in the film.

action

Two powerful aristocratic families from Verona, the Montecchi and the Capuleti, hate each other to the point of blood. Nevertheless, Romeo Montecchi falls in love with Giulietta Capuleti. An old monk secretly trusts the lovers, and it seems that fate means well for both of them. But then Tebaldo provokes an argument in which he is dangerously injured by Romeo. Romeo is then banished from the city and meets his loved one for the last time. In Romeo's absence, Giulietta's father demands that she marry Tebaldo in spite of everything.

Giulietta seeks help from the old monk who married her. He gives her an anesthetic to drink that makes her appear dead for 24 hours. Romeo learns of the alleged death of his loved one and returns to Verona, where he kills himself in grief at the sight of Giulietta sleeping - just before Giulietta wakes up.

Giulietta does not want to be without Romeo for a second and stabs a dagger in the heart of the dead Romeo.

background

The film was produced by Film d'Arte Italiana and Pathé Frères . It was also awarded by Pathè Frères , whose Pathécolor color process was used in the film. The recordings were made in Rome. Director Ugo Falena also directed the camera. Augusto Genina wrote the script. The film has 16 subtitles . Its production cost 990 Reichsmarks.

Romeo e Giulietta premiered in Italy on January 25, 1912. It also ran in England, France, Spain and America, where it premiered on January 3, 1913. For the premiere in the “Alhambra” theater in Milwaukee , manager Samuel 'Roxy' Rothafel had his own background music composed and put the singers in appropriate historical costumes.

In Germany, the film was submitted to the censorship office at the Berlin Police on January 6, 1912 and was registered under No. 15528, 15529 found free of minors. The police censorship office in Munich, on the other hand, spoke under No. 7682, 7683 a youth ban. Performances are occupied from April 6th to 8th, 1912 in Dolleschel's Biograph-Theater Rendsburg (as “Romeo and Juliet”).

reception

“Romeo and Juliet” is the first film adaptation of the Shakespeare tragedy that focuses entirely on the tragic story of the lovers in Verona and gives the main actors wide scope for development.

The film was enthusiastically received at its premiere. The elegant pictures were praised as well as the sensitive staging and the opulent furnishings.

The film is mentioned in

  • Ball No. 125
  • Cinema Muto No. 4203
  • CP No. 523
  • Cinema + Echo du cinema, 03/15/1912
  • VUP, 03/09/1912

and is recorded at

  • Birett: Directory of films run in Germany, Munich 1980 (Munich), No. 501, 1913.

Restoration, re-performance

In 1997 the film was restored analogously by the Nederlands Filmmuseum , then digitally in 2003 by ZZ Productions in cooperation with the EYE Film Instituut Nederland , formerly the Nederlands Filmmuseum, and can now be viewed in the original Pathé colors. The digitally restored version, using material from the Museo Nazionale del Cinema di Torino , Gosfilmofond in Moscow and the Library of Congress in Washington, still measures 653 meters and was premiered on the Arte cultural channel , where it was shown in the original with German subtitles on 27. June 2003 aired. Arte also commissioned compositions for new accompanying music.

Web links

Illustrations

  • Movie poster for the Film d'Arte Italiana and numerous still photos in original colors at cinekolossal.com
  • Photo by Ugo Falena (1875–1931)

items

Movie

  • Romeo e Giulietta , Film d'Arte Italiana / SA Pathé-Fréres, 1912 [Copy of the Museo Nazionale del Cinema di Torino , 653 m, 32 min. at 18 fps, color with Dutch subtitles], at vimeo.com

literature

  • Robert Hamilton Ball: Shakespeare on Silent Film: A Strange Eventful History (= Routledge Library Editions: Film and Literature. Volume 1). Routledge Publishing, 2013, ISBN 978-1-134-98084-0 , pp. 125-127, 335, 367.
  • Herbert Birett: Directory of films run in Germany. Film censorship decisions 1911–1920. Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Stuttgart. Saur, Munich 1980.
  • Ivo Blom: Pordenone, Verona . online at wordpress.com (Oct. 21, 2013)
  • Alan Goble: The Complete Index to Literary Sources in Film. Verlag Walter de Gruyter, 1999, ISBN 3-11-095194-0 , pp. 420, 780, 933.
  • Courtney Lehmann: Screen Adaptations: Romeo and Juliet: A close study of the relationship between text and film . A&C Black Publisher, 2010, ISBN 978-1-4081-3095-7 .
  • Franco Lonati: Segnati dalle stelle: Romeo and Juliet al cinema (= Scienze linguistiche e letterature straniere. Contributi Strumenti / Lingue e Lett.) Verlag V&P, 2009, ISBN 978-88-343-1826-3 , p. 185.
  • Ross Melnick: American Showman: Samuel "Roxy" Rothafel and the Birth of the Entertainment Industry, 1908-1935 . Columbia University Press, 2014, ISBN 978-0-231-15905-0 .
  • Eddie Sammons: Shakespeare: A Hundred Years on Film . Scarecrow Press, 2004, ISBN 0-8108-4446-X , pp. 115, 119.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ kinotv.com mentions Gerolamo Lo Savio as director besides Falena , Lehmann (2010) only mentions this one.
  2. ↑ cf. it.wiki (Italian)
  3. ↑ With the old Pathécolor paint process from the Pathé company, stencils were produced picture by picture, all of which left out the areas that were to be colored afterwards. Cf. Ellenbruch, Lexicon of Film Terms
  4. ↑ Table of contents at opencritics.de ( Memento of the original from 23 August 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. according to arte.tv @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.opencritics.de
  5. ↑ cf. Ivo Blom: Pordenone, Verona
  6. ↑ cf. GECD # 32510
  7. ↑ IMDb release info
  8. ↑ 334 W. Wisconsin Avenue, Milwaukee, WI 53201, meanwhile demolished, cf. cinematreasures.org
  9. ↑ real Rothapfel, cf. Signature under the photograph from 1914.
  10. ↑ cf. Melnick p. 77: "For the American premiere of Film d'Art's Romeo e Giulietta (1912) Roxy returned to the Alhambra in Milwaukee where he oversaw the creation of a new score for the film and costumed its singers in thematic garb."
  11. ↑ cf. GECD # 32510
  12. ↑ so the film lexicon 2001.
  13. ↑ Information according to GECD # 32510
  14. ↑ cf. Ivo Blom: Pordenone, Verona