Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Acknowledgments
- Contents
- Introduction: Avant-Garde, Advertising and the Managing of Multiplicity
- 1 Absolute Advertising: Abstraction and Figuration in Ruttmann's Animated Product Advertisements (1922-1927)
- 2 The Cross-Section: Images of the World and Contingency Management in Ruttmann's Montage Films of the Late 1920s (1927-1929)
- 3 Statistics and Biopolitics: Conceiving the National Body in Ruttmann's Hygiene Films (1930-1933)
- 4 “Überall Stahl”: Forming the New Nation in Ruttmann's Steel and Armament Films (1934-1940)
- Afterword: Of Good and Bad Objects
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Filmography
- Index of Names
- Index of Film Titles
- Index of Subjects
4 - “Überall Stahl”: Forming the New Nation in Ruttmann's Steel and Armament Films (1934-1940)
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 December 2020
- Frontmatter
- Acknowledgments
- Contents
- Introduction: Avant-Garde, Advertising and the Managing of Multiplicity
- 1 Absolute Advertising: Abstraction and Figuration in Ruttmann's Animated Product Advertisements (1922-1927)
- 2 The Cross-Section: Images of the World and Contingency Management in Ruttmann's Montage Films of the Late 1920s (1927-1929)
- 3 Statistics and Biopolitics: Conceiving the National Body in Ruttmann's Hygiene Films (1930-1933)
- 4 “Überall Stahl”: Forming the New Nation in Ruttmann's Steel and Armament Films (1934-1940)
- Afterword: Of Good and Bad Objects
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Filmography
- Index of Names
- Index of Film Titles
- Index of Subjects
Summary
Introduction
If the decision to surround Ruttmann with party loyalists for the making of Blut und Boden did stem from any suspicion of an eminent Weimar modernist, that suspicion was short-lived. Almost immediately after the completion of BLUT UND BODEN, Darré's Stabsamt des Reichsbauernführers rehired Ruttmann, this time as principal director, for a short cultural film entitled ALTGERMANISCHE BAUERNKULTUR (ANCIENT GERMANIC AGRARIAN CULTURE). Premiering on 14 April 1934 in a closed screening attended by Darré, Himmler and several other prominent figures from the Stabsamt des Reichsbauernführers and the Reichsnährstand, the film went on to play in the preliminary program (Vorprogramm) at the Ufa-Palast am Zoo before touring German theaters the same year. Employing several Weimar actors – most notably Fritz Rasp who had played in dozens of big-budget films, including a stint in Fritz Lang's Metropolis as the “Thin Man” – it told the story of a devoted member of the Hitler Youth (Claus) who defends the honor of the ancient Germanic people when a liberal professor (“Dr. Sandmann”) depicts them as savages and nomadic peoples without a sedentary culture. Among other things, the film was notable for its interactive format. In a variation on the “prize contest” format often used in advertising films, in which audiences were prompted to solve a riddle or engage in some other similar activity, Ruttmann had the student address the spectators directly at the end of the film, calling on them to contribute to the propaganda campaign by sending in letters to the Reichsbauernführer:
Tell us briefly how you would respond to Dr. Sandmann. Write out your answer and send it to the advertising department in the Central Office of the Reich Peasant Leader in Berlin. Your participation in this contest will help us to eliminate once and for all the historical lie that our Germanic ancestors were barbarians and nomads! Help us to reawaken the pride of the German Volk in its millennia-old culture of farming.
In contrast to traditional prize films – for example the Viennese film WO SIND DIE MILLIONEN? (WHERE ARE THE MILLIONS?, 1925), which was combined with a contest to win a bicycle – ALTGERMANISCHE BAUERNKULTUR did not invite its audience to win anything.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Walter Ruttmann and the Cinema of MultiplicityAvant-Garde Film - Advertising - Modernity, pp. 133 - 172Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2014