Black film

The Black Film AG in Ostermundigen was a Swiss film lab . The company specialized in film development, light determination, negative cutting and positive production for cinemas.

Founded in 1945 by Edgar Black (1917-1982), is made black film as a pioneer of 16 mm - narrow film in Switzerland a name. It developed into a film laboratory of international importance and counted directors such as Marc Forster , Spike Lee , Wim Wenders and Jean-Luc Godard among its clients. In the 1960s, Schwarz Film employed 75 people. Its owner, Edgar Schwarz, advocated film politics, for example in 1962 for the film law , and co-founded the Swiss Film Center .

After the death of Edgar Schwarz, the emerging video technology increasingly oppressed the film business. In 1989, Schwarz Film, now managed by Hans Probst, took over its former competitors Eoscop and Cinegram / Turicop , but then had to undergo a reorganization and restructuring. From 1995 onwards, Philipp Tschäppät continued to expand abroad; Schwarz Film now had branches in Berlin and Ludwigsburg . However, the increasing digitization of the film business, the low production volume in Swiss film and the high exchange rate of the franc put Schwarz Film under increasing economic pressure. In 2007 the laboratory was sold to the German Arri and in 2010 to the Zurich Egli Film . At the end of September 2011, Schwarz Film ceased business operations due to open bills of half a million francs.

swell

• Hans Jürg Zinsli: A black day for Swiss film . In: Berner Zeitung , September 30, 2011. Accessed September 30, 2011.
• The end of an era . In: Der Bund , September 29, 2011. Retrieved October 9, 2011.
• André Amsler: Schwarz Film or 60 years of film history . In: Ciné-Bulletin 360 (October 2005).

Web links

• Black movie in the Internet Movie Database (English)