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What was new in 2016?

(Scroll down for acquisitions  to our Collection as the year unfolded....)

 

Our  "Besatzung Dora"  book now available !

 The Making of The Crew of the Dora 

 

Front and back covers of our new book!  The book in now in print, and a limited number of copies are available for sale in Australia. This is the first book ever devoted to this 1942 Karl Ritter war film in any language, drawing on previously unpublished sources to which we had exclsuive and complete access!

Our new book " The Making of The Crew of the Dora," written by William Gillespie, was published by German Films Dot Net in mid–February  2016. The book uses research from the exclusive access to Karl Ritter's unpublished diary entries from May 1942 through to August 1943 to tell the story of how the feature film  Besatzung Dora was conceived, written, produced, and filmed in occupied France, in Berlin, in Italy and deep inside the Soviet Union, 85 miles south of the Siege of Leningrad, between August and December 1942. Over 50,000 words of these diary entries have been transcribed from Ritter's Sütterlin handwriting and translated into English by the author. The book also contains 90 photographs, sketches, maps and charts -- many of which are being published for the first time -- with 219 footnotes. The  book is  319 pages long, Perfect–bound as a trade paperback, 6 x 9 inches in dimension. The book has been issued ISBN # 0-9808612-3-5. It is available for purchase exclusively via this website's Poster Shop.  Orders can only be sent to an Australian address. Foreign customers please check the website of International Historic Films or Amazon Books for order fulfilment from the USA at the US$29.95  retail price and postage.

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 LAST OPPORTUNITY to buy the full–colour

poster plate edition of the book Karl Ritter.

 

 You can purchase at a great discount price, the book Karl Ritter – His Life and 'Zeitfilms' under National Socialism (2nd expanded edition, with 19 full colour poster plates) and the DVD for the Ritter Luftwaffe film Besatzung Dora  together in a special combo offer from International Historic Films using this link.  The price from IHF is only US$45.95 for both the book and DVD, plus postage. This offer is limited to less than 30 copies of the book, which when sold, will be replaced by an all–B&W 2nd edition of the book, with all 19 posters also in B&W.

 

 

New ! A great money–saving combo offer  for

both the Dora book and the re–mastered DVD

of  Besatzung Dora! 

 

International Historic Films has just added our new book The Making of the Crew of the Dora to its catalogue and has a special combo price of the book plus the IHF re–mastered DVD of the film Besatzung Dora for the great price of US$45.95 plus shipping. Click here for the direct link of this money–saving special offer from IHF. 

 

 

 

 

 

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1st purchase of 2016! At 10:41am Sydney time on 1 January 2016:

A rare Italian Fotobusta for Karl Ritter's VERRÄTER. A high quality photograph/scan of this Fotobusta has now been added to our Poster Gallery.  The film had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival in 1936, and was a highly popular film with both critics and the public.

 

 

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On January 21st, the extremely rare original second French poster Motif for the Veit Harlan film Jud Süß was found and immediately purchased for this Collection.

The film was titled Le juif Suss and the poster dates from 1940. It is 70 cm x 100 cm (approx. 23 inches x 33 inches) in size. The poster is in remarkably fine condition for its age, with only a few small tears and yellowed paper. The poster can be seen, along with the other French poster and the two Italian, the Böhmen & Mähren, and the Belgian original posters, in our poster Gallery.

 

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In 1939, Spanish director Edgar Neville, who had worked in Hollywood for many ears, produced a Spanish Civil War film for Mussolini based on his best–selling book Carmen fra i Rossi (Carmen & the Reds).

The title role of Carmen was played by the accomplished and very popular actress Conchita Montes. It was decided given the subject matter, that a Spanish version would also be filmed simultaneously. It was the first–ever collaboration on a motion picture by Franco Spain and Fascist Italy. The Spanish version was titled Frente de Madrid (Madrid Front). The only difference in the two vesions, besides the language, was that in the Italian film the male lead was cast with the ever–popular Fosco Giachetti, whereas in the Spanish film the hugely popular Rafael Rivelles (famous for his outstanding Don Quixote film, amongst others) was in the lead male role.  We have just acquired the very rare original 1940 film poster of Frente de Madrid and added it to our Poster Gallery.

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The 1937 German film portfolio of individual film brochures (opening night invitations) to the prestigious Venice Film Festival was acquired.

Included were the world premiere invitations for the Emil Jannings film Der Herrscher and Karl Ritter's Patrioten. Two others of note are the Hans Zerlett melodrama starring La Jana and Hannes Stelzer, Truxa, and the Detlef Sierck melodrama Zu neuen Ufern with the great Zarah Leander, sent to the Womens' Prison in Parramatta, Australia as a murderess caught up in London intrigue and betrayal. Here is a photo of the portfolio cover and the contents.

 

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Die Degenhardts (1944) Lobby Card set purchased !

Thirty–five lobby cards have been acquired in one Lot of this late war feature film starring the great Heinrich George, as the father of a German family in Lübeck during WWII. Die Degenhardts was one of the very few contemporary war films which showed the destruction of a German city due to Allied air bombings. George played the role of a civil servant who is passed over for promotion and cannot tell his family that he has been given a pension instead of a promotion. He 'goes to work' every morning from home but eventually his family discovers his dilemma, and rallies to his side. He is subsequently called back to service when the war takes his successor into the military, and he finds himself as City Building Inspector. The melancholy heartbreak of civilian deaths and the wanton destruction of his beloved city's landmarks, cultural treasures, churches and homes is evident. The film was one of the last to have a movie poster issued to promote it, and we have the extremely rare original poster in our collection here. With this acquisition we have 38 lobby cards and 5 large press photos from the late–war film.

 

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Some 800 bound issues of Der Film and  the Film–Kurier Tageszeitung  have been purchased!

The issues are:

Der Film – Die illustrierte Wochenschrift, 1936 (Halbjahr 07-12) 

Der Film – Die illustrierte Wochenschrift, 1938 (Halbjahr 07-12) 

Der Film – Die illustrierte Wochenschrift, 1939 (cpl.Vol.Jan-Dec.)

Der Film – Die illustrierte Wochenschrift, 1941 (cpl.Vol.Jan-Dec.) 

Der Film – Die illustrierte Wochenschrift, 1941 (cpl.Vol.Jan-Dec.)

                                                         Film-Kurier – Tageszeitung 1941 (cpl.Vol.02.Jan. – 31.Dec.1941) 

                                                         Film-Kurier – Tageszeitung 1942 (Halbjahr 2.Jan.–30.June 1942) 

                                                         Film-Kurier – Tageszeitung 1943 (cpl.Vol. 02.Jan.–31.Dec.1943)

There are some scattered individual issues missing from these bound volumes. These new issues have now been catalogued in our Filmzeitschrift section under the PUBLICATIONS tab found amongst the Menu at the top of each webpage. and missing issue #s noted.  This acquisition brings the total number of Third Reich film newspapers in our collection to just over one thousand individual issues between 1936 and 1945.

 

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Four colourful original Italian "Fotobusta" posters for Karl Ritter's Stukas (1941) have been added to our Poster Gallery.

 

 

 

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In April, five outstanding new acquisitions were made to add to our original German film posters from the pre–1945 era.The posters include two further poster "Muster" of the Luftwaffe film, DIII88. This means that we have ALL THREE of the film posters released in Germany for this film -- a unique constellation.

Below, left, we show the three posters from the cinema owners' guide (Werberatschlag), and on the right, the 3rd original  DIII88 poster which was acquisitioned by our Collection.

 

 

Of the five posters purchased, we have three major Peter Pewas original posters for Veit Harlan"s 1938 biopic Das unsterbliche Herz,  for DIII88  and for the Hans Bertram film, Feuertaufe, for which the cameraman was the eldest son of Karl Ritter, Heinz Ritter.  We also have the extremely rare poster for the documentary film from July 1936 called Sport und Soldaten, which ran 67 minutes and reputedly dealt with soldiers preparing to participate as athletes in the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. All these new posters are now in the Poster Gallery on this website.

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A second poster for the Hans Zöberlein film Stosstrupp 1917  was acquired at auction in early May. It is from Vienna, Size: 108.6 x 48 in. (276 x 122 cm).  It is printed in three sheets, given its length. It was meant for a Litfaß outdoor advertising column.

 

 

 

 

 

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In grateful remembrance for the work contributing to the design of the German air film POUR LE MERITE, Autumn 1938  (signed)  Karl Ritter

 

That is the inscription at the bottom of this framed film still personally signed by Karl Ritter. The WWI era Fokker 3-Decker plane was obviously built for the film production, and Ritter presented this framed photograph as a thank–you memento to the aircraft company. This rare and undoubtedly "one – off" film treasure now enters our Collection. (28 June 2016).

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An A3 (approx. 11 x 17 inch) B&W film advertisement from a Dresden cinema in late 1942 offers the premiere of the Japanese air force military film Nippons Wilde Adler (Moyura Özara, 1940) known in Englsih as The Flaming Sky/The Burning Sky. Director Abe Yutaka and film studio Toho had acess to 900 actual aircraft. The film is generally described in film histories as Imperial Japan's first "Hollywood film" in terms of character development and high-quality aerial photography and air combat scenes. Film director and Luftwaffe Major Karl Ritter and his wife Erika attended a Berlin Ufa Palast am Zoo cinema screening on 9 June 1942, three days after the lavish premiere attended by German and Japanese military officers and dignitaries, including Japan's Ambassador to Germany and Dr. Goebbels. The film ran for some weeks in Berlin and then was a popular film in other capitol cities across Greater Germany.  The film is available in Japan today  (without subtitles) from the still existent "Toho Co, Ltd." as DVD #TDV16142 for ¥4,500.

 

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Before he started his filmmaker's career by working as a film assistant or Dramaturg with, amongst others, Alfred Hitchcock, Jaques Feyder, and Richard Oswald, Karl Ritter was an accomplished graphic artist working for the two silent film studios, EMELKA-FILM A.G. and Südfilm A.G. He designed 365 film posters for these studios prior to 1930. We have now acquired his poster (#155 of the 365 ) for the 1927 film  ' Sif,'  Das Weib das den Mord beging.  starring Paul Wegener and Grete Mosheim,  Director Arthur Bergen.  The poster is en route to us and will be added to our Poster Gallery after it is photographed. This is a terrific acquisition to our Karl Ritter holdings. Interestingly, the author of the novel upon which the 'Sif' film was based, Friedrich Reck–Malleczewen, wrote the story upon which the Nazi–era Henker–Frauen–Soldaten film was based. We have that film's poster in the Collection, as well. 

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The Das Programm von Heute film programme was published from the early days of sound film in Germany until late in WWII. It passed through various designs and formats, but was for most of these years a programme which offered the cast and credits of a new film, the plot synopsis, along with B&W images from the film. Film images often  were combined in an attractive montage as a centerfold of the programme. As well, a cardboard postcard of one of the film's leading stars was also printed, and with a die-cut the card was attached to the front cover of the programme. Today, hundreds of loose "PvH" artist postcards are for sale on ebay and in German flea markets, as well as the printed programmes with or without their matching cards. Although there were "PvH" printed for the NS propaganda films such as Hans Westmar, SA Mann Brand, Hitlerjunge Quex, etc, none of these programmes have survived, or if they have, they are held tightly in private collections or archives. None of them have been offered in the marketplace for decades, and one cannot find images of those particular film "PvH". In August this year, we acquired a rare postcard meant for one of the film's Programm von Heute. It shows actor Emil Lohkamp as the Nazi hero and martyr Hans Westmar, in front of a flag, in SA uniform and cap, in an iconic pose from the Hans Westmar film (1933).  

 

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We have won at auction the original Danish poster for the classic film of the von Kleistplay, Der zerbrochene Krug, starring Emil Jannings. It was filmed in 1937 by Director Gustav Ucicky. After WWII, Jannings was held to be a Nazi and unable to re-establish his career and Ucicky was banned by the Allies because of his "hate film" against the Poles, Heimkehr.  The film is considered today a classic, and one of the best examples of a stage play filmed for the movie screen. It is available on DVD commercially in Germany (and via Amazon) and an english language subtitled version was circulating some years ago via the Goethe Institute. The poster was printed in Copenhagen and measures 62 cm X 85 cm (approx. 24 inches X 33 inches.) 

 

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A  Besatzung Dora  acquisition of the first magnitude!

Our recent call, on our page devoted to the banned film, for anyone with further Besatzung Dora/The Crew of the Dora film materials to come forward, has been answered for a first time. A private collector in Germany has sold us eleven mint condition large lobby cards (approximately 10 x 12 inches) as well as the very rare original "Das Programm von Heute" wartime tri-fold brochure on the film.  We would like to thank this private film collector, Uwe,  for his willingness to part with these extremely rare original film photographs. Our Collection had up to this point 4 such Dora lobby cards and 6 smaller (approx. 6 x 9 inches) press photos. All of these previously held photos appear in our book on the film.  

Amazingly, of the 11 new lobby cards, only one was a duplicate amongst the 3 lobby cards we had.  So our holdings of different Dora lobby cards rises from 3 to 13, and our overall holdings with the 7 press photos rises from 10 to 20 different photographs of this interesting film.  With the "Programm von Heute" purchased as well, we now have both variations of this hard-to-find brochure.  The federal German Bundesarchiv–Filmarchiv in Berlin has but 4 press photos and zero lobby cards for Dora in their archive, as confirmed in June 2015 when we scoured any material for our book outside of our own Dora and Karl Ritter holdings.

There were 30 Dora lobby cards issued by Uƒa before the film was banned prior to its  scheduled premiere at the end of March 1943. 

Of the eleven newly-found lobby cards, six are from scenes in the film which took place in the Occupied Soviet Union, at or near the Gostkino airbase used by the German Luftwaffe from 1941 to 1944.  One of those lobby cards shows two Gostkino airbase personnel at a table of the "Bildstelle" photographic lab, where air reconn film was processed and evaluated by staff to determine future bombing targets over enemy territory, or to confirm the effect of previous bombing missions. We show below (left) the lobby card in question. Next to it is Photo 54 out of our book on the film, which was found in a private soldier's wartime photo album, from the time he served at the Gostkino airbase, including the time that Karl Ritter and his Uƒa film team came to film Dora footage.  The men in both cases are the same...whilst it is no great surprise that the two Luftwaffe personnel at the Bildstelle were used in the film, it is a nice discovery that the soldier whose photo album we have in the Collection was in the Bildstelle with his camera when the Uƒa Standfotograf -- the stills photographer on the Dora production team – was taking photos for publicity and marketing purposes, and that both men's cameras got similar shots.

 

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The  second  rare Der ewige Jude  poster acquired,  at auction in Manhattan!

     

On 22 September, German Films Dot Net won for it's Collection the extremely rare second graphic design for the notorious 1940 propaganda film, Der ewige Jude (DFG, Hippler). Having purchased the first poster designed by artist Mjölnir in 2005, we were skeptical that the second poster would ever come to market;  or if it did, that we would be able to afford it.

The poster was truly a 'once in a lifetime' purchase. We were lucky to win it at a live auction held in New York City. A colour image of the poster, taken from the auction catalogue, with our watermark added, is shown here, at left. 

We have received the poster, which was mounted on linen, and we have now photographed it for our Poster Gallery. Most images of this poster reproduced on the internet or in books have exaggerated and deepened the colours of the ink, or "photoshopped" it for a more striking overall look. We have left the photograph. taken in our studio using natural, ambient room light only, as is, where it can be found alongside the other original poster for the film,  by Mjölnir.

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Although we do not own the original German poster for the 1938 film by Karl Ritter, Capriccio, starring Lillian Harvey, we are delighted to have acquired the Belgian poster for this musical comedy, which used the same graphic design as the German poster. We have received the poster and photographed it for our Poster Gallery and it is to be found here.

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We have just acquired a large collection of DIFU (Deutsch–Italienische Film–Union) materials. DIFU was the German import distributor of Mussolini Italy feature films and short cultural films for German–speaking audiences. The films were dubbed with German actors' voices (subtitles were rarely used. ) Generally, of 80 or 90 annual Italian features, about ten were chosen by German authorities for importation and dubbing for Third Reich audiences.

Here we show the annual catalogue brochures from 1939-1943 from DIFU which were acquired in this acquisition.

 

Amongst other materials we now have the original DIFU Werberatschläge for both Augusto Genina classic military films, ALKAZAR  (ALCAZAR) and his DIE WEIßE SCHWADRON, and two dozen Werberatschläge and numerous press books of DIFU films from 1940-1943. We have established a "DIFU"  pull–down menu page on our Home Page to list these titles.

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Eight original Italian Fotobusta of both German and Italian films –– Bal Paré, Wunschkonzert, Der Fuchs von Glenarvon, Titanic, Noi Vivi, Addio Kara!, Orizzonte de Sangue, Luciano Serra–Pilote -- have now been added to our Poster Gallery; as at 1 November 2016.

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Two more original very rare  Besatzung Dora  film stills have been acquired in an exchange with a private collector who contacted us.  He received  Agfacolor film stills from Veit Harlan's Immensee (1942) in exchange.; which were produced in Occupied France; and are also rare. We show one of the new Dora stills here on the right.....showing from L. to R; actors Hannes Stelzer, Joseph Dahmen, and Georg Thomalla in Luftwaffe uniforms with their air reconn squadron.

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Leni Riefensstahl's OLYMPIA   film premiere invitation card from The Reich Ministry for Peoples' Enlightenment and Propaganda,  20 April 1938  won at auction.

 

 

The card states that the premiere screening of the Olympia film at the Ministry has been shifted  by unforeseen circumstances from the 19th to the 20th April 1938, at 7pm, and that the original invitation card is still valid to the newly scheduled screening. (The 20th April being Hitler's birthday, incidentally or coincidentally....)   The back side of the card must then have been circulated on that evening by the person who receievd it, and was then autographed  by Dr. Goebbels, General von Reichenau, actresses Hilde Körber, Marianne Hoppe, Brigit Horney, and Anny Ondra, by Anny Ondra's famous husband, Max Schmeling, and by actors Gustav Gründgens, Willy Fritsch and Mathias Wieman.

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Interesting actor Fritz Rasp "Nachlass" estate materials won at auction .

A part of actor Fritz Rasp's estate was won at auction in Munich, and has a large photo album of mostly private photos, an album full of correspondence,  film studio contracts, and ephemera which will be brought back to Australia mid–2017. It weighs 5 kg / 12 lbs. A photo of the materials won is shown above.  Rasp was the quintessential German fllm villain, appearing in classic silent films such as Metropolis  and Faust, and the early sound film Dreigroschen Oper.  He is probably today best known for being the arch villain in the 1931 childrens' film Emil und die Detektive.

He was foremost a stage artist appearing in live theater; which is where he performed mostly during the Third Reich. Between 1933 and 1945 he only appeared in a handful of films, one of which was the 1943 Georg Pabst directed

"Tendenzfilm" Paracelsus, which starred Werner Krauss.  In Paracelsus, Fritz Rasp played the character of the fanatical Magistrate, shown LEFT amongst his fellows.

Even though Rasp did not appear in many films between 1933 and 1945, he was nonetheless held in high regard by the regime, and was invited to attend and participate in various state–sponsored film and artistic events. From the materials won at auction, we show below two such invitations Rasp received in 1938 in Berlin  and 1939 in Munich. We shall be adding more materials  to our website on  a designated Fritz Rasp page next year after the remaining film ephemera is physically in our hands.

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