Joseph Goebbels' call to create revolutionary films with an artistic touch, rather than blatant propaganda, was not understood in the early years. Nevertheless, three "Potumkin"-style films were made, about the period of the struggle for power. The best known of these is the "Hitler's Youth Quacks" (1935), which had a huge success and influence. After the removal of the "brown shirts" from the party, these "Savior Victim" films became irrelevant. The familiar and cumbersome "popular cinema" was not a solution either. It was obligatory to invent something new.
In the professional press, a discussion was held in 1936 on the subject, in which "cinematic avant-garde" was not a derogatory word, in contrast to the other branches of art. The German filmmakers in this abstract style, who were inspired by Futurism and Dada, won great and sympathetic articles. The first sequel was Karl Junghans' documentary about the Winter Olympics in Germany in 1936. It was an avant-garde style film, which was supported by Junghans in an article in which he presented it as representing the "new and modern time". He argued that the clear cinematic language of "Potumkin", with its montages and cutting-edge camera, should be distinguished from the amorphous content presented by faceless masses. Goebbels' demand thus became a criterion. The avant-garde has transformed from art to its name into a modernist tool in the service of murderous rule.
The question now was how to assimilate the artistic criteria of the cinematic avant-garde, having been detached from Soviet bluntness, into National Socialist content. Here Lenny Riefenstahl first provided the creative answer. In her documentary films about the Nazi regime's shows, she combined camera, music, and montage as key and original elements. Riefenstahl preferred sharp shooting angles inspired by "mountain movies". She did "creative research" on the characters using many cameras. She created a dramatic edit and attached all of these to dramatic music. In this way she was able to present mass experiences in a creative way, in the totalitarian regime where every work of art had to have a purpose. This created an original German style, which became known as the "Heroic Reportage". This style was adopted for widespread use in Nazi Germany thanks to its modernity, surprising ability, and visual totality.
The shortage of original feature films, those that portrayed the life of the German laborer as dynamic and satisfying, was even more pronounced. Airman Carl Ritter was the first to fill in the blanks, in a style he called "Zeitfilm". This was in fact Riefenstahl's style, with a plot-propaganda content, inspired by a well-developed artistic sense and strict order, which were his artistic hallmark. Ritter has created feature films in various genres, which have given him the opportunity to systematically shape his modernist artistic message, while at the same time extensively developing the nationalist and propaganda message.
During World War II, the "Zeitfilm" films came to fruition. They presented daily life in Nazi society, but were almost absent from its outward signs, such as salutes. They were also meant for export, and prominent symbols in the background were an obstacle to that. The typical "Zeit [period] film" was certainly required to be used as an alternative to entertainment cinema, but not with the aim of completely replacing it or causing a revolution. It served as an ideological self-affirmation, one that would prove that National Socialism could achieve the same results achieved by Soviet cinema.
Carl Ritter explained the meaning of the term in the lecture "Zeitfilm and Contemporary History", which he gave in Hamburg in September 1936. At the beginning of his speech he sought to give the art of cinema the respect it deserved and to stop treating it as cheap entertainment. The state has already taken this step, when it has organized and nationalized the entire field. He came out as a buffer against the "realist" studio films that were typical of the Weimar period, which were detached from reality, because they superficially characterized the characters, plots, and backdrops. He took an example from Soviet cinema, which managed through real realism to absorb the spirit of the period and excite the audience, because it managed to express a very wide range of human realms. The "Zeitfilm" is mainly a film that makes a cross-section of this time, which create a cinematic report. But there is no need to present criminals in it, but the positive and beautiful, using examples from the classic German street. Cinema in Nazi Germany is a national venture, and is suitable for "Zeitfilm" because it is capable of presenting a quality cross-section of the entire population, culture, and history. Ritter wanted to further create light-hearted entertainment films, which are the bread and butter of the industry, but asked that one in ten films be serious. He claimed that despite their seriousness, the Zeitfilms could be the art of cinema at its best, citing the example of his "Traitor".
"Poetic cinema" is a comprehensive definition, involving the essence of poetry, with many challenges involved. It stands out in its position in relation to the common commercial-entertainment film and characterizes films with a significant statement, created by "Authors". As a rule, the artistic film does not stand in binary contrast to Hollywood cinema, but is placed in a different place across the continuum. An important question is whether "Zeitfilm" is close to poetic cinema. The answer is that the main characteristic of poetic cinema is the ability to understand something from something. In poetic cinema, lyrical expression is a challenge to viewers, existing in the tension between the two basic modes of cinema: realism and formalism, in which all cinema films are located. On one side of the continuum are the documentary and neo-realistic cinema, which are easy for average viewers to understand, as they has no visual surprises that stop the full narrative move. On the other side of this sequence is expressionist, artistic and surrealist cinema, also known as "formal" or "poetic", which uses "open images" that can be interpreted and are intended for elite audience. At the center of the sequence is the "classic" cinema, in which all the elements are intended to serve the plot, with the clear aim of not attracting the viewer's attention to anything else. The "Zeitsfilm" cinema lacks open images and all the elements in it are intended to serve the ideological purpose. It is a classic cinema, designed for a wide audience and all the elements in it, like directing, photography, music, acting, editing, set design and the like, serve the plot narrative.
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