Film Front Weimar’ 30-10-2002 14:10 Pagina 1
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* pb ‘Film Front Weimar’ 30-10-2002 14:10 Pagina 1 The Weimar Republic is widely regarded as a pre- cursor to the Nazi era and as a period in which jazz, achitecture and expressionist films all contributed to FILM FRONT WEIMAR BERNADETTE KESTER a cultural flourishing. The so-called Golden Twenties FFILMILM FILM however was also a decade in which Germany had to deal with the aftermath of the First World War. Film CULTURE CULTURE Front Weimar shows how Germany tried to reconcile IN TRANSITION IN TRANSITION the horrendous experiences of the war through the war films made between 1919 and 1933. These films shed light on the way Ger- many chose to remember its recent past. A body of twenty-five films is analysed. For insight into the understanding and reception of these films at the time, hundreds of film reviews, censorship re- ports and some popular history books are discussed. This is the first rigorous study of these hitherto unacknowledged war films. The chapters are ordered themati- cally: war documentaries, films on the causes of the war, the front life, the war at sea and the home front. Bernadette Kester is a researcher at the Institute of Military History (RNLA) in the Netherlands and teaches at the International School for Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Am- sterdam. She received her PhD in History FilmFilm FrontFront of Society at the Erasmus University of Rotterdam. She has regular publications on subjects concerning historical representation. WeimarWeimar Representations of the First World War ISBN 90-5356-597-3 in German Films of the Weimar Period (1919-1933) 9 789053 565971 bernadette kester Amsterdam University Press Amsterdam University Press WWW.AUP.NL Film Front Weimar Film Culture in Transition General Editor: Thomas Elsaesser Double Trouble: Chiem van Houweninge on Writing and Filming Thomas Elsaesser, Robert Kievit and Jan Simons (eds.) Writing for the Medium: Television in Transition Thomas Elsaesser, Jan Simons and Lucette Bronk (eds.) Between Stage and Screen: Ingmar Bergman Directs Egil Törnqvist The Film Spectator: From Sign to Mind Warren Buckland (ed.) Film and the First World War Karel Dibbets and Bert Hogenkamp (eds.) A Second Life: German Cinema’s First Decades Thomas Elsaesser (ed.) Fassbinder’s Germany: History Identity Subject Thomas Elsaesser Cinema Futures: Cain, Abel or Cable? The Screen Arts in the Digital Age Thomas Elsaesser and Kay Hoffmann (eds.) Audiovisions: Cinema and Television as Entr’Actes in History Siegfried Zielinski Joris Ivens and the Documentary Context Kees Bakker (ed.) Ibsen, Strindberg and the Intimate Theatre: Studies in TV Presentation Egil Törnqvist The Cinema Alone: Essays on the Work of Jean-Luc Godard 1985-2000 Michael Temple and James S. Williams (eds.) Micropolitics of Media Culture: Reading the Rhizomes of Deleuze and Guattari Patricia Pisters and Catherine M. Lord (eds.) Malaysian Cinema, Asian Film: Border Crossings and National Cultures William van der Heide Film Front Weimar Representations of the First World War in German films of the Weimar period (1919-1933) Bernadette Kester Amsterdam University Press To Klazien The translation of this book was funded by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) Front cover illustration: Conrad Veidt in Die andere Seite Back cover illustration: Hermine Sterler and Helga Thomas in Deutsche Frauen Deutsche Treue All photographs: Bundesarchiv/Filmarchiv Berlin Original title: Filmfront Weimar, 1998, Hilversum, The Netherlands Translated by Hans Veenkamp Cover design: Kok Korpershoek, Amsterdam Lay-out: japes, Amsterdam isbn 90 5356 598 1 (hardcover) isbn 90 5356 597 3 (paperback) nur 674 / 686 © Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam, 2003 All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, me- chanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permis- sion of both the copyright owner and the author of the book. Contents Preface and Acknowledgements 9 Introduction 11 The aftermath of the First World War 11 The War Experience 12 Research into war films: film historians 16 Siegfried Kracauer 19 Cultural historians: Eksteins, Winter and Mosse 21 Carrying out the research 25 Press sources 28 Chapter arrangement 30 Chapter 1: ‘Lehrreich und amüsant’ – Historical films in the period 1896-1933 33 German film industry during the First World War 36 Bufa and Ufa 39 Screening the war 41 Film in the Weimar Republic 45 Censorship 46 The military in film 49 From relative stability to crisis 53 Chapter 2: ‘Die Legende von der Unschuld’ – Films about the run-up to the war, especially 1914. Die letzten Tage vor dem Weltbrand 59 The Weimar Republic and the Kriegsschulddebatte 60 1914. Die letzten Tage vor dem Weltbrand 63 ‘Zensur – der böse Engel’ 69 Emil Ludwig and the Kriegsschuldfrage 71 Der Doppelmord von Sarajewo 75 Brandstifter Europas 77 Critical reception of 1914 80 Political context 82 6 Film Front Weimar Chapter 3: ‘Das Dokumentarische gewinnt die Oberhand’ – Archival footage and constructions in war films 87 Der Weltkrieg, an official outlook on the war 90 The beginning of the war 95 The battles of Liège, Tannenberg and the Marne River 97 The battle of Ypres, the myth of Langemarck 99 The battles at Verdun and the Somme 102 Fort Douaumont at Verdun 103 The battle at the Somme 104 Somme and Douaumont, monuments for the unknown soldier 106 Tannenberg 112 Tannenberg without Von Hindenburg 113 History and tragedy 115 Chapter 4: ‘Wenn wir Helden wären, wären wir schon längst daheim’ – Realism and anti-war tendencies in four films 123 Literary context: war literature 123 Namenlose Helden 125 Westfront 1918 127 The war scene 131 Cinematography 134 Die andere Seite 136 Niemandsland 141 National identities 144 The reviews 147 Comradeship, heroism and nationality 152 Chapter 5: ‘Auf dem Meere, da ist der Mann noch etwas wert’ – Films about the German navy during the First World War 161 The surface ships 164 Unsere Emden and Kreuzer Emden 164 Criticism, mythologisation and intertextuality 168 Scapa Flow and the navy rebellion 172 The U-boat films 175 Die versunkene Flotte and U9 Weddigen 175 Critical reviews 180 Drei Tage auf Leben und Tod 181 Morgenrot 183 The press 189 Contents 7 Chapter 6: ‘Neid, Leid, Tränen – das ist der Krieg’ – Gender and war films 193 Das deutsche Mutterherz and Deutsche Frauen – Deutsche Treue 194 Motherhood and fatherland 198 Suffering and love in other war films 200 Companionship and betrayal: Ich hatt’ einen Kameraden 206 Husbands coming back home: Feldgrau and Heimkehr 212 Epilogue 219 The various narratives 220 Myths 223 Critical assessment 224 Complex representations 225 Notes 227 Credits Weimar War Films 291 Archives and Libraries 303 Bibliography 305 Index of names 319 Index of subjects 325 Preface and Acknowledgements People have often wondered why I chose to spend so much time of intensive research on a subject so loaded with violence and human suffering. In daily life I am known as someone more interested in harmony and balance than in con- flict and extremes. Maybe my fascination for historical events of violence origi- nated from the need to understand how people can cope with such tragic and extreme experiences. War is the situation which produces the greatest upheav- als in the life of individuals as well as nations. In what way do people come to terms with such devastating experiences? How have the books and films about the First World War, made in Germany, contributed to the act of coming to terms with a past so difficult to digest? A close reading of German war films made during the Weimar period and of the way these films were received might lead to answers to these questions. Ahistorical investigation requires years of effort and struggle with the remains of an unmanageable past, especially because this work of research involves several subdisciplines: besides film studies – film history in particular – histor- iography, military history and press history. Thanks to the sincere interest in the subject and the valuable criticism of a number of people with various back- grounds, it was possible to master the different angles and perspectives to complete this book. Prof. Piet Blaas (Emeritus professor) was a great inspiration, not least be- cause of his enthusiasm for the subject. Prof. William Uricchio (MIT and the University of Utrecht) and the participants of the seminar he instigated were a constant and stimulating influence. I also owe a great deal to Dr André van der Velden, a most critical reader and a good companion during our walks through Berlin. I am also grateful for the valuable advice of, among others, Dr Bas Schot (University of Leiden) and Dr Annette Förster during the final phase of actu- ally finishing the book that was first published in Dutch in 1998. I thank Prof. Thomas Elsaesser for encouraging me to publish my book in English. Last but not least, I would like to express my feelings of appreciation to the friendly people of the Bundesarchiv/Filmarchiv in Berlin where I did most of the re- search; they were of great help. During the periods I spent in Berlin I had the privilege to stay with Renate Assmus, who has become a dear friend. Introduction The aftermath of the First World War ‘The war experience is an ultimate confirmation of the power of men to ascribe meaning and pattern to a world, even when that world seems to resist all pat- terning.’1 This quotation from Eric John Leed’s No man’s land puts the main concern of the present study in a nutshell, that is, the problematic nature of as- cribing meaning and form to an unprecedented historical experience, the ex- perience of the First World War.