Hitlerjunge Quex

Hans Steinhoff: Hitlerjunge Quex (DE 1933) starring Jürgen Ohlsen. "A film about the spirit of sacrifice of the German youth".

DE 1933. PC: Ufa. P: Karl Ritter. 

    D: Hans Steinhoff. SC: K. A. Schenzinger; Bobby E. Lüthge – based on the novel by Schenzinger. DP: Konstantin Irmen-Tschet. AD: Artur Günther. M: Hans-Otto Borgmann. Theme song written for this film "Unsere Fahne", lyrics : Baldur von Schirach (it became the official HJ song). S: Walter Tjaden. ED: Milo Harbich. 

    Loc: Berlin-Müggelsee, Seddinsee bei Berlin, Anhalter Bahnhof.
    C: Heinrich George (Father Völker), Berta Drews (Mother Völker), Jürgen Ohlsen (Heini Völker), Claus Clausen (Bannführer Kass), Ramspott (Kameradschaftsführer Fritz Doerries), Helga Bodemer (Ulla Doerries), Hermann Speelmans (Communist Agitator Stoppel), Rotraut Richter (Gerda), Karl Meixner (Fanatical Communist Wilde), Hans Richter (Franz), Ernst Behmer (Kowalski), Hans-Joachim Büttner (Doctor), Franziska Kinz (Nurse). 92 min.
    This film has been banned in Germany since 1945. It was never released in Finland and has been screened in our country only at the film archive screening 13 Feb 1976 at Cinema Bristol (thank you, Leena Suvanto, for this info).
    A Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung print screened by special permission of Auswärtiges Amt with e-subtitles in Finnish by AA and and introduction by Pasi Nyyssönen in Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 9 Dec 2008.

AA: A beautiful print.

The Hitler-Jugend film supervised (n.c.) by Baldur von Schirach.

There were three Nazi propaganda feature films produced in the "Kampfzeit", the period of the struggle. This, the third, portrays Nazis as the ideal for the young. They defend themselves against Communist violence with self-discipline and in a spirit of sacrifice. There is no racism in this picture.

Although this was the only of the three that was unreservedly approved by the Nazi leaders, it was reportedly in active circulation only for one year. Already by the end 1934 its line was old-fashioned.

Steinhoff (1882–1945), a talented and experienced director, advanced to the top of the industry on the basis of this film. Let's first state that this is a film to legitimize the brutal, anti-democratic, militaristic, and racist coup of the Nazi movement.

For an explicit propaganda film, the film has interesting features.

1) Visually it is strongly linked to the great tradition of the Weimar cinema, although Nazis fought Weimar culture as decadent.

2) One of the main locations is the Rummelplatz, the pleasure garden, so important in German since Caligari and before. It is portrayed in an inventive and original way.

3) The role of the Moritatensänger is interesting as a social commentator and the popular poet of dark deeds.

4) The lucrative Swiss army knife has an interesting symbolic role. It is a recurrent motif, always with a different meaning.

5) Heinrich George is at his best as the Communist father, a complex and powerful role. He's seen as a figure of elemental power, with a capacity to tenderness and empathy but also to brutality, misled by the Communists. The classic scene is when he hears his son sing the HJ song and teaches him the Internationale manually, slapping his face to the rhythm of the song! There is a direct link to his Franz Biberkopf in Piel Jutzi's version of Berlin-Alexanderplatz.

6) Berta Drews is very moving as the mother. The double suicide sequence is the film's most forceful, three minutes without dialogue, with powerful music theme by Hans-Otto Borgmann in the otherwise non-stop talking movie. It brings to mind Mutter Krausens Fahrt ins Glück, also by Piel Jutzi.

7) Stoppel (Hermann Speelmans) the Communist agitator is an interesting fellow, with lucrative and humoristic characteristics.

8) Rotraut Richter is attractive and believable as the Communist seductress Gerda.

9) And Jürgen Ohlsen (1917–1994) as Quex, a difficult role, is perfect. This was his first film in a film career of only two feature films.

10) All other Nazis are bland.

11) The "Unsere Fahne" theme song sounds more engaging here than in Triumph des Willens.

A remarkable work in the history of German cinema justifiedly banned as the legitimation of a murderous movement.

Kleider machen Leute / L'Habit ne fait pas le moine (2008 restoration by Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique in cooperation with Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv)

Hans Steinhoff: Kleider machen Leute (AT 1921). Hermann Thimig (Jaro).

Kleider machen Leute / Bräutigam auf Kredit – version francaise: L'Habit ne fait pas le moine. 

     AT 1921. PC: Volo-Film. D+SC: Hans Steinhoff – based on the short story “Kleider machen Leute” by Gottfried Keller (1874); intertitles: Homunculus [Robert Weil]; DP: Anton Pucher, Herr Kieselau; AD: Hans Neumann (interiors), Hans Dostal, Robert Reich; COST: Karl Alexander Wilke; art titles + trick images: Mayblond [Michael Maybaum]; 

    CAST: Hermann Thimig (Jaro/Jago Strapinsky), Dora Kaiser (Nettchen/Dora, Judge Polski’s daughter), Hugo Thimig (Landlord of the “Golden Scales” Inn /“Hotel Wasily”), Thea Oesy (Erika), Wilhelm Schmidt (Melchior Böhnli/Bonislas), Franz Kammauf (Judge Polski), Cornelius Kirschner (Vicar), Eugen Günther (Pharmacist), Fritz Straßny (Professor), Josef Moser (Notary), Viktor Kutschera (Beggar), Hans Thimig (Fool); 

    orig. l: 1893 m; restored French version: 1675 m /18 fps/ 81 min (Desmet colour, duplicating original tinting and toning); print: Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique. Restored by Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique, Bruxelles, in cooperation with Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv, Berlin. 

    French intertitles with e-subtitles in English and Italian, grand piano: Günter A. Buchwald. 

    Viewed at Le Giornate del Cinema Muto, Pordenone, Cinema Verdi, 7 October 2008.

(When there are two character names, e.g., Nettchen/Dora, the first is that of the original German version, the second that of the French version.)

Horst Claus: "Following the screening of the Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv’s restored prints of Steinhoff’s silent films by the Giornate del Cinema Muto since 2002, the Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique discovered and, in 2005, restored a tinted and toned French version of the director’s debut film, Kleider machen Leute, entitled L’Habit ne fait pas le moine (the French proverbial equivalent of the original German title). A comparison of this print’s second reel with its – up to now – only surviving German counterpart (shown at the Giornate in 2004) indicates that both are based on the same materials. In both cases the plot-line adheres closely to Gottfried Keller's original short story (first published in 1874), which relates events surrounding the penniless tailor Jaro (French version: Jago) Strapinsky, who recently has lost his job. Dressed in his best clothes while looking for new employment, he is picked up by the coachman of a Count’s carriage, who – after dropping him off in Goldach – makes the greedy landlord of the town’s hotel believe that his passenger is a wealthy and important melancholy aristocrat. The news of the mysterious stranger’s arrival spreads like wildfire among the town’s citizens, who hope to benefit financially or socially by being associated with the supposedly high-ranking personage. Their attention, combined with their eagerness to shower him with credit he has not asked for, make it impossible for Jaro either to get away secretly or reveal his true identity – with embarrassing as well as happy consequences for both sides."

"Shot mainly on location in the Vienna Woods between June and August 1921, the film was made by Steinhoff’s own Vienna-based production company Volo-Film. Besides producing and directing it, Steinhoff also wrote the scenario and supplied the ideas for the extensive designs of the intertitles. Acquired by Hanns Lippmann’s Gloria-Filmgesellschaft (a subsidiary of Ufa), Kleider machen Leute premiered to unanimous critical acclaim at the end of 1921 in Berlin, as Bräutigam auf Kredit (“Groom Through Credit”, a title which Ufa’s publicity department considered had stronger audience appeal than the original). Though a financial flop, it paved the way for Steinhoff's entry into the German film industry. It also was the reason why, for a number of years, several critics regarded him as one of the most promising film directors of the time (some even saw in him a potential successor to Ernst Lubitsch)."

"Compared with the Berlin censorship card, which contains a list of the German intertitles, the surviving French print is 214 metres (11%, or approximately 10 minutes) shorter than the German release print. Due to deterioration of the film stock there are gaps at the beginning of Reel 3, when the citizens of Goldach try to curry favour with Jaro/Jago. Further visual material is missing in Reel 4, when Boehnli (French version: Bonislas) plans his intrigue against Jaro/Jago, by inviting the Tailors Guild to perform a pantomime that will ridicule and expose his rival for the love of Nettchen (French version: Dora), the daughter of Goldach’s highest civil servant. Wear and tear are responsible for lost material at the start and end of some of the reels – most prominently at the end of the film, which apparently did not conclude with the couple’s wedding, but continued with a summary of Jaro’s private and business development, culminating in a sequence in which Jaro/Jago and Nettchen/Dora are seen in old age, surrounded by grandchildren. There is some evidence of deliberate attempts to speed up the action by cutting or shortening shots designed to support character development and the creation of atmosphere. Visually, for example, the original opening sequence seems to have placed a far greater emphasis on Jaro/Jago’s pride in his outer appearance. Interference of this kind stands in contrast to the addition of (in most cases unnecessary) explanatory intertitles to the French version. (The first reel alone, with 42 intertitles, contains twice as many textual interruptions than the German print.) Instead of simply replacing the humorous rhyming couplets of the original with their French translations, those responsible for the French print (in line with the film’s subtitle “Comédie sentimentale en 5 Parties”) made do with prose titles that add a sentimental touch to the narrative. Furthermore, their attempt to hide the production’s German provenance by claiming in the opening credits that it is of Polish origin, and performed by renowned artists from the Warsaw People’s Theatre (“Interprétée par les réputés artistes du Théâtre Populaire de Varsovie”), reflects the impact of anti-German sentiment on the international distribution of German-language films in the years following World War I. Though made in Austria and featuring three members of the renowned Austrian acting dynasty of the Thimig family, it purports to be set in Poland, reflecting that country’s comic mores and manners. (“Cette Comédie, qui se déroule en Pologne, n’est qu’une trés humaine étude de moeurs où a été respecté tout ce qui fait le charme des traditions de ce pays.”) Among the curiosities that crept into the film during its conversion from an Austrian to a Polish production for French audiences, today’s spectators will also be intrigued to note that the good people of Goldach, whom the film presents as living in the Biedermeier period, roughly the first half of the 19th Century, already went to the cinema several decades before the medium had officially been invented:“Tous les soirs, comme d’autres vont au Théâtre ou au Cinéma, l’aristocratie du village se réunit à l’Hôtel Wasily.” – Horst Claus.

A soft duped look in the print. It is nice to see Hermann Thimig, the Lubitsch favourite (Die Puppe) in this role. I watched only the beginning. There is something Gogolian (The Inspector-General) in this Gottfried Keller story.