Our village
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | They found a home |
| Original title | Our Village / The Village |
| Country of production | Switzerland United Kingdom |
| original language |
Swiss German English |
| Publishing year | 1953 |
| length | 100 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 12 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Leopold Lindtberg |
| script |
David Wechsler Kurt Früh Peter Viertel |
| production |
Lazar Wechsler for Praesens-Film , Zurich Kenneth L. Maidment |
| music | Robert Blum |
| camera |
Emil Berna Gerald Moss |
| cut | Gordon Hales |
| occupation | |
| |
Our village , in Germany and Austria under the title You found a home , in the Federal Republic later also under Children in God's Hand (The Pestalozzidorf) , is a Swiss-British feature film from 1953 by Leopold Lindtberg . This drama, based on the idea of international reconciliation, tells the individual fates of children around the Pestalozzidorf in Trogen, Switzerland .
action
Heinrich Meili is the head of the Pestalozzi Children's Village in Trogen. As such, he heads an institution that is committed to the principle of international reconciliation and wants to spread Pestalozzi's humanistic, holistic ideas , especially among the traumatized and traumatized children of Europe who were particularly affected by the Second World War. Meili's staff among the students and teachers is very international; one day he greets a new teacher, the British and ex-soldier Allan Manning. His colleagues include u. a. a Polish woman, a Frenchman and an Italian. One night, under almost conspiratorial circumstances, a new student arrives; it is the orphan Anja. The girl escaped from an orphanage in Germany and absolutely wanted to come to Trogen because she had heard so many good things about this educational institution. In her naivete, she also asks that the namesake, the “Dr. Pestalozzi ”(1746–1827). The young Pole Andrzej, who believes that the girl is a homeless Polish woman, quickly becomes friends with Anja. But when she speaks German in her sleep one night, the mood changes rapidly. Immediately she met hostility, even sheer hatred, from the other children.
The children show themselves mercilessly in their rejection, as if they had never heard or understood the principles that define this educational institution, and through their behavior they pervert all the principles of Pestalozzi’s upbringing. Anja is chased by an angry pack of children. With great difficulty she can find shelter in a barn, where the teaching staff finds her freezing from fear and cold. The teachers now take on the children of different nationalities and make their barbaric behavior clear to them. From now on there should only be respect and tolerance, otherwise nothing would have been learned from the horrors of the Second World War. In the course of time the minds calm down again. But other children also have their problems. Andrzej, for example, is badly marked by the events of the war in his Polish homeland: every kind of match, not to mention an open fire, arouses panic in him. He himself experienced the burning homeland as a toddler and has been traumatized ever since. The pictures he drew and painted always show fires, ruins and faces distorted by fear. Meanwhile, teacher Wanda is called back to Warsaw by her communist superiors. She returns for Christmas with a communist watchdog from the local embassy in tow. It is made clear to the Pestalozzidorf administration that the Stalinist government in Warsaw no longer suits the entire humanistic orientation of this Swiss institution and that they therefore want all Polish children to return to the People's Republic. Wanda, on the other hand, would definitely like to stay in Trogen, as she has since fallen in love with the British "class enemy" Allan Manning.
The two 13-year-old Polish children Anja and Andrzej also refuse to answer their government's call to return. When they are taken home by train, they escape in an unnoticed moment and escape into a forest. You come across an Appenzell folk festival, the nightly Chlausejage, which is celebrated with lots of fireworks. Andrzej's old images of the burning Warsaw in 1939 and the dying parents shoot through his head again. In a panic he runs away, followed by his loyal friend Anja. Both find shelter in a ruined monastery. The Polish orphan feels safe here, as the Andrzej underground catacombs are reminiscent of the Warsaw sewer system, a place of rescue for numerous capital city dwellers during the German siege. In a moment of inattention, Andrzej falls down and is seriously injured. The Pestalozzidörflers have meanwhile heard of the disappearance of the children from the train, and people go looking for them with torches. When Wanda finds her dying compatriot Andrzej and takes him in her arms, she makes a decision. She will forego her love Allan and return behind the Iron Curtain with the remaining Polish children to devote herself entirely to the orphans of her homeland. That same evening it begins to snow and a new child enters the Pestalozzidorf. I would like to speak to Mr Pestalozzi.
Production notes
The shooting of Our Village dragged on from October 1952 to April 1953 due to numerous delays. The interior recordings were made in the Rosenhof film studio, Zurich, and in the Nettlefold Studios, Walton on Thames. The exterior shots were made in Trogen, Arth Goldau, Stein am Rhein, Säntis and in Freising, Germany. The premiere took place on April 25, 1953 during the Cannes Film Festival, and a few weeks later (June 20, 1953) the film was also shown at the Berlinale. The German mass start took place on July 3, 1953, also beginning in Berlin. Our village was first seen in Switzerland on October 1, 1953 in the Apollo cinema in Zurich. The international distribution title was The Village (British premiere on September 10, 1953 in London, US premiere on September 22, 1953 in New York).
For director Lindtberg, Our Village was the first film he had made as a Swiss citizen. Although in the 1940s he was the only world-famous film director in this country to bring fame and honor to Swiss cinema with works such as The Last Chance , Swiss authorities exposed Lindtberg to numerous harassment and work restrictions during and even after World War II. In 1946 (!) Even his expulsion was ordered. Only in 1951 was the Viennese, who was married to a woman from Zurich, granted Swiss citizenship.
The screenplay for this story worked with co-author David Wechsler, the son of producer Lazar Wechsler, in the same year 1953 for a novel (“They found a home”). Kurt Früh assisted director Lindtberg and was also involved in some scenes as a director (second team). The film-experienced Brit Muir Mathieson was the musical director. For Lindtberg this film should mean the end of his feature film directing (more on this see below).
Development history and background
Our village is the late implementation of an old favorite project by Lazar Wechsler , who had already announced in October 1938 that he wanted to film the life of the reform pedagogue with his Praesens film under the direction of Robert Siodmak . But it was not until shortly after the end of the Second World War that the implementation of this film project took shape. In order to be able to market this film well internationally, Wechsler looked for a production partner whom he found in an insignificant British company. In addition, Wechsler signed a star in Bergman's films with the Swede Eva Dahlbeck . He entrusted the central role of Andrzej to the young Wojtek (in English: Voytek) Dolinski, a teenager who in the spring of 1952 had a success on Broadway in New York with the play “ Flight Into Egypt ”.
The film, the cost of which is quoted at well over a million Swiss francs, was a brilliant flop despite Wechsler's great advertising efforts: “The benevolent press condemned the work indiscriminately, but this time the audience abandoned it everywhere, so that the presences were splendid at the time Loss of 700,000 CHF has been recorded. The blame is on the titles, the advertising and the actors who are not well known. In truth, Lindtberg is the first to admit that the film is several years late - the humanitarian scam with the orphaned cohorts has outlived itself, pacifist expressions of pity are no longer up-to-date, kindness hardly pays off any more. " In addition, the film had the great misfortune that the Cold War had entered its hot phase, and at the time of the various premieres of Our Village the rampant McCarthyism in the USA, the consequences of Stalin's death and above all the current workers' uprising in the GDR ( June 17, 1953) made headlines and determined the general public interest.
Leopold Lindtberg decided not to extend his contract, which had already expired on March 31, 1953, after the constant arguments with Wechsler during the production phase and the artistically profoundly unsatisfactory compromises. From then on he concentrated entirely on his theatrical work and only returned behind the camera for a short documentary film, two stage plays and several television directors.
Awards
- "Valuable" rating from the federal German film evaluation office of the federal states
- 1953 Silver Laurel (David O. Selznick Prize) for the “best film in English that promotes international understanding”.
- 1953 bronze bear with the III. International Film Festival Berlin
- 1954 “Annual Best List 1954” of the Catholic Film League
Reviews
“The arrangement is not too happy. While the two teenagers shown are ... understandable in terms of their emotional peculiarities, they tend to become mere symbols of youthful suffering in a poorly written story. And this makes the plight of all young people at the center of the film abstract and academic ... (...) Except for the clear fact that it is a tragic shame that the lives of children are being ruthlessly uprooted by political maneuvers in these times there were few dramatic moments or intellectual indignation in this ending. In fact, we can't even argue that the acting is worth mentioning. (…) The intentions of the film are good and generous, but its execution is well below that. "
“ Our village portrays Lindtberg's swan song at the Praesens and the final shipwreck for their films with a humanistic message - never before has one of these works been created so laboriously and with internal tensions that cannot be resolved as our village (…) is definitely and fatally lacking This film has courage and coherence: the courage to make political statements (which are awkwardly painted over with humanitarian varnish) and the concession to the feature film, also the courage not to please - too numerous, simultaneous kippers in the direction of government agencies, churches, UNESCO, the timid management of the Pestalozzidorf… let this formally extremely well-kept film tip over into a sea of blandness. Our village is the suicide of a company that no longer knows what to say - or perhaps has nothing more to say. "
"An important topic, moving and staged with humanitarian commitment, but designed in an undemanding manner."
Web links
- Our village in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Our village 1953 film portrait on cyranos.ch
- full review in the New York Times
Individual evidence
- ↑ 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. 314.
- ^ Hervé Dumont: The history of Swiss film. Feature films 1896-1965. Lausanne 1987. p. 348
- ↑ a b c Hervé Dumont: The history of Swiss film. Feature films 1896-1965. Lausanne 1987. pp. 446 f.
- ^ Translation: "The arrangement is not too felicitous. While the two youngsters thus exposed ... are touchingly and plausibly suggestive of the emotional abnormalities of the lot, they tend to become mere symbols of juvenile anguish in a poorly written tale. And thus the plight of all the youngsters, which is the evident subject of the film, becomes abstract and academic… (…) Except for the obvious indication that it is a tragic shame that the lives of children should be recklessly uprooted by political maneuvering in these times, there is little dramatic impact or intellectual outrage in this end. We can't even say that the performances of the actors are notable. (...) The intentions of the film are fine and generous but its execution is some few cuts below. "