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Nazi propaganda film about Theresienstadt / Terezin

Film | Digitized | Accession Number: 1991.260.1 | RG Number: RG-60.0269 | Film ID: 201

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    Nazi propaganda film about Theresienstadt / Terezin

    Overview

    Description
    Excerpt of well-known propaganda film made by the Nazis to show the International Red Cross and others that they were not mistreating Jews in the "ghettos." Documentary footage depicts the life of Jews in the ghetto of Theresienstadt [Terezin] in Czechoslovakia as harmonious and joyful. They wear yellow stars on their civilian clothing but are euphemistically called residents ["Bewohner"] instead of inmates. They look well-dressed and well-fed and keep smiling. No SS guards or other armed Germans are shown.

    Shots include: men and women work contentedly on farm, in factories, making pottery and sculpture, seamstresses and tailors, cobblers, etc. Yellow stars visible on their clothing, but people smile, implying satisfaction. Recreational activities include spectator sports event in an enclosed, porticoed courtyard; concert (various views of attentive, mannered, well-dressed crowds); library; flourishing community garden; children at play; women and men socializing; barracks. Final view is family dinner scene.

    The conductor of the orchestra at 09:56 can be identified as Karel Ančerl (1908-1973), founder and conductor of the String Orchestra at Theresienstadt. Ančerl is leading the orchestra in a performance of the Studie pro smyčcový orchestr (Study for String Orchestra), composed at the camp by fellow prisoner Pavel Haas (1899-1944). Haas was deported to Auschwitz and killed soon after this sequence was filmed. Ančerl, however, survived the war, and eventually recovered most of the orchestral parts to Haas' composition. A performing edition of the reconstructed score, edited by the Czech musicologist Lubomír Peduzzi, was published in 1991 (https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/bib18907).
    Film Title
    Theresienstadt
    Duration
    00:14:58
    Date
    Event:  1944
    Production:  1944
    Locale
    Terezin, Czechoslovakia
    Credit
    Accessed at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Bundesarchiv Filmarchiv
    Contributor
    Director: Kurt Gerron
    Producer: Karel Peceny (Aktualita Prag) for SS-Zentralamt zur Regelung der Judenfrage in Boehmen und Maehren
    Camera Operator: Ivan V. Fric
    Camera Operator: Cenek Zahradnícek
    Supervisor: Hans F. Guenther
    Supervisor: Karl Rahm
    Subject: Karel Ančerl
    Biography

    Physical Details

    Language
    German
    Genre/Form
    Propaganda.
    B&W / Color
    Black & White
    Image Quality
    Mixed
    Time Code
    02:50:22:00 to 03:05:20:00
    Film Format
    • Master
    • Master 201 Video: One Inch - NTSC
      Master 201 Video: One Inch - NTSC
      Master 201 Video: One Inch - NTSC
      Master 201 Video: One Inch - NTSC
    • Preservation
    • Preservation 201 Video: Digital Betacam - NTSC - large
      Preservation 201 Video: Betacam SP - NTSC - large
      Preservation 201 Video: Digital Betacam - NTSC - large
      Preservation 201 Video: Betacam SP - NTSC - large
      Preservation 201 Video: Digital Betacam - NTSC - large
      Preservation 201 Video: Betacam SP - NTSC - large
      Preservation 201 Video: Digital Betacam - NTSC - large
      Preservation 201 Video: Betacam SP - NTSC - large

    Rights & Restrictions

    Conditions on Access
    You do not require further permission from the Museum to access this archival media.
    Copyright
    Federal Republic of Germany. Bundesarchiv.
    Conditions on Use
    Researchers who wish to use this footage should contact the Bundesarchiv Filmarchiv at filmbenutzung@bundesarchiv.de to sign a release, or submit the online request form at: https://www.bundesarchiv.de/EN/Content/Downloads/request-for-use-av-material.pdf?__blob=publicationFile

    Keywords & Subjects

    Administrative Notes

    Film Provenance
    The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum purchased this from the Bundesarchiv in Berlin, Germany in September 1991. The footage was transferred at Bibo TV in Germany and obtained as research for the Museum's Permanent Exhibition.
    Note
    Mimi Fischman Berger is the teenager sitting on the table at 03:04:50 with a writing pad (her hair is parted on the side and clipped). She was interred for 4 years in Terezin from ages 16-20. Mimi eventually immigrated to Palestine after the war because her father had arranged for a false marriage with an Orthodox Jewish family. They divorced immediately. Mimi became one of the first 12 flight attendants for El Al. You can learn more about her experience from her testimony: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/vha4080. Mimi's mother, Helena Fischman, is also in the film wearing a striped sweater and knitting while talking to another woman at the table in the barracks sequence. Helena was deported from Terezin not long after the making of this propaganda film and exterminated.

    Theresienstadt, established in November 1941, was the central ghetto for Jews from the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. From July 1942 on, the ghetto also contained Jews decorated with German army medals as well as 'prominent' Jews and older Jews from several western European countries. It functioned as a transfer camp for deportations to the death camps in Poland and the occupied Soviet Union. After repeated requests by officials of the International Red Cross from October 1943 on, the SS agreed to allow a visit on June 23, 1944. Comprehensive 'beautification' measures took place in preparation for the visit in order to camouflage the ongoing mass murder of European Jewry to the world. Theresienstadt was presented as a 'model Jewish settlement.' Hans Guenther, the head of the regional SS-Zentralamt zur Regelung der Judenfrage [Central Office for the Regulation of the Jewish Question] in Prague, developed the idea to produce a movie depicting the 'excellent' living conditions for Jews in Theresienstadt (most probably in December 1943). The scenes in the film show camp life and feature the inmates in their day-to-day lives. Living conditions in Theresienstadt (and especially the efforts in education and culture organized by the Jewish council) were better on average than those in the Polish and Soviet ghettos. However, the movie crassly exaggerated the quality of life and omitted the harsh reality of overcrowding, hunger, diseases, and death that defined life in Theresienstadt.

    Beside the cinematography, inmates of the ghetto were used in all functions (including the director Kurt Gerron) to produce the film under close supervision by the SS. Immediately after the end of shooting in September 1944, Gerron and other cast members were deported to Auschwitz where they perished. After the final cut on March 28, 1945 the Czech company Aktualita received RM 35,000 from Guenther's office for the production of the movie. The movie was intended to be screened to international audiences like the International Red Cross and the Vatican. Following the first screening in early April 1945 to high-ranking government and SS officials in Prague there were at least three more screenings to international humanitarian emissaries in Theresienstadt itself on April 6 and 16, 1945. Plans for a further distribution to broader audiences in the neutral states never materialized because of the progression of war.

    Since 1945 no complete copy of the entire ninety minute film has been located. There are only fragments available at different archives. The infamous title "Der Fuehrer schenkt den Juden eine Stadt" ["The Fuehrer Donates a City to the Jews"] is not original - it was given by survivors of Theresienstadt in the aftermath.

    The film was shot over 11 days between August 16 to September 11, 1944. Other fragments of the same film are on USHMM tapes 243 (story 269), 140 (story 80), and 2310 (story 2615).


    Other Credits:
    Script: Kurt Gerron using drafts by Jindrich Weil and Manfred Greiffenhagen
    Music: Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, Sholom Secunda, Hans Krása, Jaques Offenbach, Pavel Haas, Max Bruch, Dol Dauber

    See Film and Video departmental files for articles and background on the 1942 and 1944 filming.

    The full title of this film is: Theresienstadt: ein Dokumentarfilm aus dem Juedischen Siedlungsgebiet [Theresienstadt: a documentary film about the Jewish settlement]. The often-used title for this film is: Der Fuehrer schenkt den Juden eine Stadt [The Fuehrer gives the Jews a City].
    Copied From
    35mm b/w print
    Film Source
    Bundesarchiv (Germany). Filmarchiv
    File Number
    Legacy Database File: 565
    Source Archive Number: 3372 R1+2
    Record last modified:
    2024-02-21 07:55:01
    This page:
    https:​/​/collections.ushmm.org​/search​/catalog​/irn1000172

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