Tranquility and lightness
Tran und Helle was a popular short film series in Nazi propaganda . The humorous films about the well-informed national comrade Helle and the clumsy, dumb Tran were shown in the opening programs of the cinemas. Ludwig Schmitz played the Tran in the Wochenschau series, Helle was portrayed by Jupp Hussels .
action
The short films consistently follow a fairly simple dramaturgy. The Tran , portrayed as naive and seductive, succumbs all too easily to the whisperings and temptations of foreign "enemy propaganda" in words (newspapers, books) and sound ( BBC London). So he always has doubts about the correctness of the Second World War instigated by the National Socialist rulers and verbally complains about the deprivations caused by the war or begins to hoard food or to behave in some other way “harmful to the people” contrary to the rules of conduct spread through Nazi propaganda. The figure of Helle is designed as an “exemplary national comrade” in such a way that he enlightens the “dumb” Tran about the (in the Nazi sense) “truth”, brings him back on the right track ideologically and guides him to correct action.
These minutes-short films (1939/40) were directed by Johannes Guter, who has been a feature film director since the First World War .
Others
Usually the short episodes were embedded in the newsreel. The series was discontinued in the fall of 1940 - the rulers now saw the danger that viewers could identify with Tran.
The film couple Liese and Miese formed a female analogy .
literature
- Hans-Jürgen Singer: Tran and Helle. Aspects of entertaining "Enlightenment" in the Third Reich. In: Publizistik , Volume 31, 1986, pp. 346–356.
- Gerhard Stahr: Volksgemeinschaft in front of the screen? National Socialist Film and its Audience. Publisher Hans Theissen, Berlin 2001.