Walter Heynowski
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Walter Heynowski (born November 20, 1927 in Ingolstadt ) is one of the best-known and most important documentary and propaganda film directors in the GDR together with Gerhard Scheumann . He has also worked as a copywriter, scriptwriter , screenwriter and producer on numerous films.
Life
After the war, in which he participated as an air force helper and soldier, he first began studying theology and then economics at the University of Tübingen before he was editor of the Reutlingen youth magazine “Die Zukunft” from 1946.
At the end of 1948 he came to Berlin, where he initially worked as an editor for the Berliner Zeitung . From 1949 to 1955 he was editor-in-chief of the satirical magazine "Frischer Wind", which appeared from 1954 under the title " Eulenspiegel ". He was the founder of the "Eulenspiegel-Buchverlag". From 1956 on he worked for the German TV broadcaster (DFF), initially as an author, director and head of the "Zeitgezeich" series, from 1959 as deputy general manager and program director. During this time, Heynowski worked primarily with the cameraman Rolf Sperling , whose trick technique remained a style-defining feature for Heynowski's later work.
In 1963 he moved to the VEB DEFA studio for documentary films, where he worked as an author and director and from 1965 worked with Gerhard Scheumann . In 1969, the foundation was a common, independent of the DEFA film studios: the Studio H & S .
After a critical speech by Gerhard Scheumann on the subject of "SED media policy" at the IVth Congress of Film and TV Creators in the GDR, the studio was ordered to be closed. Heynowski and Scheumann went back to DEFA. At the same time, the two authors were also prohibited from using their “H&S” logo. The ban was only lifted in 1986 with the film " The Generals " about the Generals for Peace .
Walter Heynowski worked for the DEFA documentary film studio until 1991. He was a member of the Academy of Arts of the GDR and multiple national prize winner . Books of the same name have mostly been published for numerous films by Heynowski and Scheumann.
criticism
At that time, Heynowski and Scheumann were praised for their analytical sharpness and their political commitment, but from today's perspective Heynowski and Scheumann are accused of " polemics , gross agitation and ideology," writes the DEFA Foundation . The working methods of H & S were also controversial: " When making their films, they repeatedly violate the minimum rules of documentary ethics, for example by veiling their identity or alcoholizing the interviewee ." (rororo-Lexikon, directors and cameramen, 1999)
Filmography
- 1960: Murder in Lvov
- 1961: Aktion J (script and direction)
- 1963: brothers and sisters
- 1964: Kommando 52 (TV, script and direction)
- 1965: OK
- 1966: The Laughing Man - Confessions of a Murderer (Director)
- 1966: Wink from the neighbor - comments on the festival (TV, book)
- 1966: Men of Honor
- 1966: Greetings from East to West
- 1966: PS to the laughing man (TV, book and director)
- 1966: 400 cc
- 1967: Homesickness for the future - Max Steenbeck tells (TV, book and director)
- 1967: Witching Hour - face to face with the Middle Ages (TV, script and direction)
- 1967: The witness
- 1967: Sincerely yours
- 1967: The case of Bernd K.
- 1968: Pilots in Pajamas (TV series, script and director)
- 1969: The President in Exile (TV, script and direction)
- 1970: The man without a past (TV, book and director)
- 1971: Bye-bye Wheelus (script and director)
- 1971: 100
- 1972: Remington Cal. 12
- 1973: Under the sign of the spider
- 1974: Yo he sido, yo soy, yo seré (Director)
- 1974: ¡Ciudadanos de mi patria! [in the FRG: citizens of my country!] (director)
- 1974: The War of the Mummies (TV, script and direction)
- 1974: I was, I am, I will be (TV, script and direction)
- 1974: Psalm 18
- 1975: The White Coup (Director)
- 1975: Meier's estate
- 1975: money worries
- 1976: One minute of darkness does not make us blind (script and direction)
- 1976: free entry
- 1976: The Devil's Island (script and direction)
- 1976: Whenever Steiner came
- 1977: Vietnam 4 - The Iron Fortress [in Germany: The Iron Fortress] (script and direction)
- 1977: The first rice after that
- 1977: I sincerely repent
- 1977: The iron fortress
- 1978: Salmo 18 [in Germany: Psalm 18] (director)
- 1978: The dead are not silent (TV, script and direction)
- 1978: Am Wassergraben (Director)
- 1978: Passed the Fire (Director)
- 1979: Phoenix (script and direction)
- 1980: Kampuchea - Dying and Resurrecting (written and directed)
- 1981: The Angkar ( writer and director)
- 1981: Exercices
- 1985: Hector Cuevas
- 1986: The Generals
- 1988: The lie and the death
- 1988: Comrade Krüger (script and direction)
- 1989: The third skin (TV, book and director)
bibliography
- The laughing man. Confessions of a Murderer. [Congo Miller]. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1966.
- Otto Köhler: Kongo-Müller or The Freedom We Defend. With a shorthand by Alexander Mitscherlich. Verlag Bärmeier & Nikel, Frankfurt am Main 1966.
- Cannibals. An occidental poetry album in self-testimonies. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1967.
- Pilots in pajamas. Interviewed by Germans: US pilots in North Vietnamese captivity. Kindler-Verlag, Munich 1967 (licensed edition by Verlag der Nation, Berlin).
- The case of Bernd K. Mitteldeutscher Verlag, Halle (Saale) 1968.
- The president in exile and the man without a past, plus a thoughtful report on The Battle of Killesberg. [Member of the Bundestag, Dr. Walter Becher]. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1969.
- Bye-bye Wheelus. Report on the rise and fall of a fortress in the African sand. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1971.
- Approach to Chacabuco. With camera and microphone in Chilean concentration camps. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1974.
- Operación Silencio. Chile to Salvador Allende. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1974.
- The devil island. The prisoner island of Con Son / South Vietnam. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1977.
- The bullet vest. Experienced in Vietnam in the summer of 1975. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1977.
- Letters to Your Excellency. Portrait of a protecting power in documents. [Letters to the US Ambassador in Saigon]. Published by Heynowski & Scheumann. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1979.
- Phoenix. Inside CIA. Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1980.
- The generals. From traditional military to strategists of peace: G. Bastian (FRG), J. Christie (Norway), F. da Costa Gomes (Portugal), M. Harbottle (Great Britain), G. Koumanakos (Greece), M. von Meyenfeldt ( Netherlands), N. Pasti (Italy), A. Sanguinetti (France). Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1986.
- Retrospective H & S / Heynowski & Scheumann. Unidoc-Film, Munich 1976.
- Walter Heynowski: The film of my life. Shot youth. Eulenspiegel Verlagsgruppe / Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-360-01295-1 .
Awards
- 1974: Patriotic Order of Merit in Gold
- 1980: National Prize of the GDR for art and literature, 1st class
- 1987: Star of Friendship between Nations in gold
- 1989: National Prize of the GDR for art and literature, first class
literature
- Claudia Böttcher, Judith Kretzschmar, Corinna Schier: Heynowski & Scheumann - documentary filmmakers in the class struggle. An annotated filmography . Leipziger Uni-Verlag, 2003, ISBN 3-936522-53-7 .
- Bernd-Rainer Barth : Heynowski, Walter . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .
- Rüdiger Steinmetz, Tilo Prase: Documentary between evidence and pamphlet: Heynowski & Scheumann and the Katins group . (= Materials, analyzes, connections. Volume 2). Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2002, ISBN 3-936522-46-4 .
- Generation in the evening light. Meander 1 . The New Berlin, Berlin 2019, ISBN 978-3-360-01347-7 .
Web links
- Literature by and about Walter Heynowski in the catalog of the German National Library
- Walter Heynowski in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Shot down - The story of the pilots in pajamas (critical documentary about H&S) ( Memento from August 15, 2004 in the Internet Archive )
- Photo review of the book cannibals by H&S
Individual evidence
personal data | |
---|---|
SURNAME | Heynowski, Walter |
BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German documentary film director (GDR) |
DATE OF BIRTH | November 20, 1927 |
PLACE OF BIRTH | Ingolstadt |