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FALL EDITION 2023

Eugen Klöpfer in Karl Grune's Die Strasse (1923). Still from the 2023 restored version. Courtesy of Stephan Drössler.
Note from the Editors
Welcome to the third edition since the launch of WeimarCinema.org a year ago.
After developing the site as an online archive and forum for research, we would like
to start a new focus on Weimar Classics. "Film Dossiers” will bring together archival
and contemporary materials about the production, distribution, and reception of iconic
films that have become part of world cinema. These dossiers can be used as
supplementary reading in film history classes. Our first dossier on
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari will
be followed by dossiers on Nosferatu, Metropolis, and other classics in due course.
In Memory of Hans Helmut Prinzler

We mourn the passing of Hans Helmut Prinzler, who died on June 18 at the age of 85. He was our friend for more than 40 years, a mentor and supporter of our work, and an inspiration as an archaeologist and chronicler of German film history. He was actively involved in the planning of this website and supported it by allowing us to reprint the Weimar section of his legendary Chronik des Deutschen Films, now in English.
Hans Helmut dedicated his life to promoting the presence of film and preserving the memory of films, first as director of the Deutsche Kinemathek Berlin, where a large library now bears his name, and curator of elaborate retrospectives at the Berlin Film Festival on Ufa and Babelsberg as well as on directors such as Fritz Lang, F.W. Murnau, G. W. Pabst, and Robert Siodmak. He was also co-editor of the first comprehensive Geschichte des deutschen Films (1993) and, as co-editor of the Hanser Reihe Film, was responsible for a series of monographs on European and American directors. In 2013, his large-format and lavishly illustrated Sirens and Sinners: A Visual History of Weimar Film 1918-1933 appeared, a volume, as one critic put it, that has “everything the Weimar film cognoscenti would want.” For an incredible span of over 60 years, from 1961 to 2023, he wrote innumerable reviews in which he documented the full range of film books and books about cinema. Six days a week, starting in early 2007, his blog would provide coverage of films, personalities, festivals, and recent DVD editions. Antje Goldau, his wife, told us that he worked from his hospital bed to complete his last entry devoted to Optische Literatur, his choice for the Film Book of the Month for June 2023.
There are no words to express the sadness we feel. We will miss his generous spirit, his love of film, and his inimitable blend of kindness, enthusiasm and Sachlichkeit. We would like to give him the last word by publishing (in translation) a speech he delivered at the German Film Academy on February 10, 2008, entitled "If Only I Had the Cinema." It underscores his deep conviction that the past can serve as a guide for the future; it also captures his life-affirming and life- enriching passion for film that we will always associate with his memory.
Tony Kaes and Rick Rentschler
NEW IN THIS EDITION
■ A review essay by Michael Wedel on new trends in recent books on Weimar film
■ A program note by Stefan Drössler for his restoration of Karl Grune's Die Strasse
■ A preview for the Silent Film Festival in Pordenone, October 7-14, 2023. More than usual Weimar films will be shown there this year: Die Strasse (Karl Grune), Der Berg des Schicksals (Arnold Fanck), Eine Frau von Format (Fritz Wendhausen), a Harry Piel series (8 films) and several Karl Valentin shorts. You can also watch some of these German films online between October 7 and 14. For more information, click here.
JUST PUBLISHED



Film History for the Antropocene: The Ecological Archive of German Cinema
SETH PEABODY
Camden House, 2023
