The Adventures Of Werner Holt (1964) + The
Axe Of Wandsbek (1951/First Run DVDs)
Picture: C+/C
Sound: C Extras: C+/B- Films: B/B-
Two more DEFA East German film classics have been released
on DVD by First Run Features and their partners Icestorm and Progress
Film-Verleih. This time, we get two more
damning anti-Nazi classics in Falk Harnack’s The Axe Of Wandsbek (1951) and Joachim Kunert’s The Adventures Of Werner Holt
(1964). Both are tales of how the Nazi
menace was easily hidden in sinister ways and allowed for an atmosphere of easy
denial that allowed everything from murder, to The Holocaust to the pillaging
of the world occur.
Wandsbek is based on a book by Arnold
Zweig about a local butcher named Teetjen (Erwin Geschonneck) is recruited in
1934 to use his skills on political prisoners.
Cleverly, we never see the executions, but the drama of the man who is
trying to lead two lives and not let anyone around him know what is really
going on. Some of it will remind you of
Fritz Lang and M in particular, with
its somewhat Noirish (by default) tendencies.
It can be uneven at timers, but is still very good.
Holt is a tale of two friends, Gilbert
and the title character, drafted into Hitler’s Army early and how it slowly
begins to affect their relationship.
Werner is still himself, but Gilbert starts to slowly become
power-hungry and becomes a character study of the men, Nazi Germany and the
people who allowed it to happen. Though
it runs 164 minutes, it is never boring, very well acted, edited, paced and was
rightly a hit at the time.
I expect both films to be rediscovered, but Holt has a certain consistency and arc
that few films anywhere achieve. In the
face of so many recent films that have tried and not fared so well to deal with
youth in the Nazi situation, it may be the best film on the subject.
The 1.33 X 1 image on both DVDs is not bad, but can show
their age, can look soft, could use some more work (especially Wandsbek) and are not HD
transfers. However, the cinematography
by Robert Baberske on Wandsbek and
Rolf Sohre on Holt is
impressive. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
on each film also shows its age and sounds like some cleaning was applied here,
but only so much can be done about the age of the audio.
Extras on both include respective text bio/filmogrpahies
on the makers of each film. Wandsbek adds an essay by Zweig and
short film on Director Harnack, while Holt
adds a very good featurette on Director of Photography Sohre that all serious
filmmakers will want to see.
- Nicholas Sheffo
