Narrating Cultural Heritage: Rubble, New Beginnings And "Clean" Slates. Film Production After 1945

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In the summer of 1945, about two months after the unconditional surrender of the German Wehrmacht, the three heads of government of the allied forces meet in Potsdam. Winston Churchill (who loses the British election during the conference and is replaced by his successor Clement Attlee), Josef Stalin and Harry Truman decide, among other things, to divide Germany into occupation zones. The victorious powers are given freedom of action in the respective zones - they do not have to coordinate with the other Allies and can pursue independent - and often contradictory - policies.

Naturally, the international press reported on the conference - from the former Ufa studios in Potsdam-Babelsberg. Films were still shot there until shortly before the Soviet troops invaded in April 1945. After the Wehrmacht surrendered, the Allies banned all film production and confiscated the assets of the National Socialist Ufa-Film GmbH (UFI). However, the film studios are virtually undestroyed and therefore suitable as a press centre for the Potsdam Conference.

Filmaktiv, DEFA, Proletarian Art: Film Production in the Soviet Zone

Berlin too is divided into four zones. In the Soviet Occupation Zone (SBZ), the city commander of Berlin, Nikolai Erastovich Bersarin, allowes cinemas and theatres to open on 28 April, even before the capitulation is signed.

Film plays an important political role in the Soviet Union and therefore also in the territories under its control. It is regarded as a mass medium and proletarian art par excellence - as a means of political propaganda, mobilisation and (re)education.

The first Soviet feature film was dubbed in Berlin as early as June 1945: Ivan the Terrible by Sergei Eisenstein. One month later, the Soviet documentary film The Liberation of Berlin by Juli Raisman premiered, showing the last days of the Second World War from the perspective of the Red Army using original footage from Soviet front-line cameramen.

In autumn, the Soviet Military Administration (SMA) calls on German filmmakers to participate in the reconstruction of film production. At the end of 1945, the German-Soviet joint stock company ‘Filmaktiv’ is founded. Its aim was to establish a new and decidedly anti-fascist film company in Germany. Just over a year after the end of the war, on 17 May 1946, Deutsche Film AG (DEFA for short) is founded in Potsdam-Babelsberg.

DEFA is initially conceived as a film company for the whole of Germany, but remains the film company for the Soviet occupation zone. After the foundation of the GDR on 7 October 1949, DEFA is gradually nationalised and eventually becomes the only film company in East Germany.

DEFA dubbes foreign productions, produces feature films and documentaries as well as the cinema news programme Der Augenzeuge.

In the Soviet Occupation Zone at DEFA, the military administration and the Soviet film distributor Sovexport controlled film projects and exercised censorship. Film projects, scripts and finished films all have to be approved individually. Until 1947, there is relatively little political influence in the Soviet Occupation Zone - the so-called Leningrad Group of ex-emigrants has a liberal attitude. Real Socialism therefore only plays a subordinate role in the early DEFA films.

All those who had remained in National Socialist Germany required a licence from the respective occupying authority to produce films, work on a film set or open a cinema. The Western allied forces were reluctant to issue such licences, instead relying on re-education through their own films and also concentrating on establishing democratic structures in broadcasting and the press.

The Western allied forces dissolve the Ufa, which had been centralised and expanded under National Socialism. Numerous small, competing production companies emerge. The competition between these companies is intended to prevent the concentration of power and influence as well as a renewed synchronisation.

In the Western zones, film production is under the control of the respective military administration. These work separately until the trizone is founded in 1949, although Great Britain and France usually copy the US policies. The Western Allies prefer to use German emigrants in the film industry. For example, the producer Erich Pommer, who had emigrated to the USA in 1933, was appointed the highest-ranking American film officer in the summer of 1946.

In addition to the justified scepticism towards German filmmakers, the USA also strives to prevent competition for its own films. For Hollywood studios, filming in Europe is advantageous, as assets are partially frozen, which means that money can only be spent in Europe and, for example, within Germany. While the licensing procedures for German films are often lengthy, directors such as Billy Wilder, Jaques Tourneur (Berlin Express) and Howard Hawks (I Was an American War Bride) shoot in Germany.

Billy Wilder emigrated to the USA immediately after the transfer of power to the National Socialists in 1933 and was able to gain a foothold there as a director. After the war, he spoke out in favour of re-educating Germans through entertainment. An example of this is Eine auswärtige Affäre with Marlene Dieterich, John Lund and Jean Arthur. The film comes across as a comedy, but at the same time addresses the treatment of Nazi collaborators, the sluggish denazification process and the plight of the German population, which is exploited by many soldiers stationed in the area.

Marlene Dietrich plays a nightclub singer who collaborated with the Nazi leadership during National Socialism. Dietrich's costumes in the film are the same as those she wore during the war for the USO, the US troop entertainment service. Despite the American production, most of the filming took place in the Soviet zone of Berlin. The film was released in cinemas in the USA in 1948 - it was initially not shown at all in Germany and was not shown on television in West Germany until 1977.

Film studios such as those in Berlin-Tempelhof and Munich-Gieselgastieg were initially used by the allied forces for their own productions. German filmmakers shot improvised and on location. From 1947, the studios were once again available to them. From this point onwards, the path that German film would take in the Federal Republic became apparent: It is a return to the studio, to the controlled, technically sophisticated studio film that had been perfected under National Socialism. It is shallow entertainment and cultivated oblivion.

Many filmmakers work both for the DEFA and for productions of the Western Allies. Some directors live in the Western zone but work in the Soviet occupation zone (SBZ). As part of the film exchange, films produced in the Soviet Occupation Zone are shown in the Western zones and vice versa. Die Mörder sind unter uns, for example, premieres in three different occupation zones. Until 1949, film production and film screenings were thus primarily separated from each other bureaucratically and ideologically.

No hour zero

Even shortly after the war, those who had already worked in film under National Socialism found employment at DEFA in particular. Only those who had openly compromised themselves during National Socialism were banned from working.

Over the years, political reliability was also interpreted more and more generously by the British and American occupation authorities. Almost all directors, writers, actors, cameramen and technicians who had not emigrated had also worked for National Socialist film productions.

US film policy became less restrictive, especially under Erich Pommer. Directors such as Josef von Báky or Harald Braun, who had made a career under National Socialism, made successful films again in post-war Germany. Heinz Rühmann, Otto Gebühr and Hans Albers, for example, continued to be active in front of the camera. Directors such as Veit Harlan, Karl Ritter and Géza von Cziffra, who had directed National Socialist propaganda films, also started making films again from the 1950s at the latest.

For German film, as for politics and public opintion, there is no zero hour, no break and no new beginning. So-called "Überläuferfilme" that were produced during National Socialism and later shown in post-war Germany, such as Via Mala (Josef von Báky) or Unter den Brücken (Helmut Käutner), literally represent a link between National Socialism and post-war Germany. Even the film careers of post-war directors such as Wolfgang Staudte were complex - he had been banned from working in 1933, but had then made commercials and feature films and appeared as an actor in Veit Harlan's Jud Süß.

Trümmerfilme, Heimatfilme, a "Clean" Slate

The term ‘Trümmerfilm’ was coined for films such as Die Mörder sind unter uns or Ehe im Schatten (Kurt Maetzig). Today, the term has a neutral to positive connotation, but at the time it was meant to be derogatory. Although the films were initially celebrated by critics, they soon stood in contrast to ‘real’ entertainment - above all because they dealt with National Socialism. The criticism of Trümmerfilme is thus an expression of the demand for a line to be drawn under the past, a "clean" slate, an ‘enough is enough’ in cinematic form. Fittingly, films from Hollywood and the British producer Arthur Rank dominated the market in post-war Germany - by the end of 1949, they accounted for up to 90 per cent of all screenings in German cinemas.

After the currency union in 1948, West German film production was under increasing pressure to attract people to the cinema. However, the claim to establish a new, democratic, political film against oblivion did not meet the wishes of either the audience or the film press. While film was increasingly subjected to political control in the Soviet occupation zone, entertainment and Heimat films established themselves in the future Federal Republic. Even if this was not as completely apolitical as had long been assumed, there could be no question of a democratic renewal of cinema.