02-20-2025, 03:58 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-24-2025, 03:41 PM by Paul Ferguson.)
"On the 400th anniversary of Paracelsus' death in 1941, the state ordered the production of a major film biography shortly thereafter. This was preceded by numerous festive events and literary publications in honour of the Swiss physician that took place in the same year.
Principal photography of Paracelsus began on 7 July 1942 and ended in early November of the same year. The film was shot at the Barrandov Studios in Prague.
Since Paracelsus died in Salzburg, the film's premiere took place on 12 March 1943 in the hall of the Salzburg Festspielhaus. Only Karl Hartl's Mozart film Wen die Götter lieben had previously premiered there. Bavaria boss Helmut Schreiber gave a short speech. Director Pabst and some of the leading actors were also present.
The Berlin premiere of Paracelsus took place on 6 May 1943.
After the film was approved by the censors, Paracelsus was given the Nazi rating ‘politically and artistically valuable’.
The film is in the tradition of various other large-scale productions of the Third Reich, with which, especially between 1939 and 1943, larger-than-life personalities of Central European history from the fields of politics, art and science were to be honoured. These include Robert Koch, the Fighter Against Death, Friedrich Schiller – The Triumph of a Genius, Bismarck, The Great King, Ohm Krüger, Rembrandt and Andreas Schlüter. The intention behind these usually very expensive and lavishly produced film biographies with high-calibre casts was always a political one: the aim was to create an analogy to Adolf Hitler and the ‘genius’ claimed for him by Nazi propaganda. The title heroes of these films were always larger than life and the visionaries who had to prevail against all competition, especially in the tough fight against the small-minded, grumblers and envious people around them, were always far superior to the mediocrity of their adversaries – in Paracelsus, these were councillors, the Magister and other rival doctors.
The expressionist dancer Harald Kreutzberg appeared in a feature film for the first time here.
The sets were designed by Herbert Hochreiter and Walter Schlick, the costumes were designed by Herbert Ploberger.
The production costs amounted to about 2,709,000 Reichsmarks. With takings of 3.5 million Reichsmarks by January 1945, the film was considered a box-office flop.
For the first post-war screening in 1959, the film was shortened from 106 to 97 minutes. The German-French cultural channel Arte broadcast a 99-minute version on 16 January 2001. The film has the same running time on the DVD, which was released on 11 October 2013. The version released by the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation in 2021 by ‘WVG Medien’ has a running time of 102 minutes."
(From Wikipedia https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracelsus_(Film) by machine translation).
Complete movie with English and Russian subtitles here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvRlBtvOk0E
Principal photography of Paracelsus began on 7 July 1942 and ended in early November of the same year. The film was shot at the Barrandov Studios in Prague.
Since Paracelsus died in Salzburg, the film's premiere took place on 12 March 1943 in the hall of the Salzburg Festspielhaus. Only Karl Hartl's Mozart film Wen die Götter lieben had previously premiered there. Bavaria boss Helmut Schreiber gave a short speech. Director Pabst and some of the leading actors were also present.
The Berlin premiere of Paracelsus took place on 6 May 1943.
After the film was approved by the censors, Paracelsus was given the Nazi rating ‘politically and artistically valuable’.
The film is in the tradition of various other large-scale productions of the Third Reich, with which, especially between 1939 and 1943, larger-than-life personalities of Central European history from the fields of politics, art and science were to be honoured. These include Robert Koch, the Fighter Against Death, Friedrich Schiller – The Triumph of a Genius, Bismarck, The Great King, Ohm Krüger, Rembrandt and Andreas Schlüter. The intention behind these usually very expensive and lavishly produced film biographies with high-calibre casts was always a political one: the aim was to create an analogy to Adolf Hitler and the ‘genius’ claimed for him by Nazi propaganda. The title heroes of these films were always larger than life and the visionaries who had to prevail against all competition, especially in the tough fight against the small-minded, grumblers and envious people around them, were always far superior to the mediocrity of their adversaries – in Paracelsus, these were councillors, the Magister and other rival doctors.
The expressionist dancer Harald Kreutzberg appeared in a feature film for the first time here.
The sets were designed by Herbert Hochreiter and Walter Schlick, the costumes were designed by Herbert Ploberger.
The production costs amounted to about 2,709,000 Reichsmarks. With takings of 3.5 million Reichsmarks by January 1945, the film was considered a box-office flop.
For the first post-war screening in 1959, the film was shortened from 106 to 97 minutes. The German-French cultural channel Arte broadcast a 99-minute version on 16 January 2001. The film has the same running time on the DVD, which was released on 11 October 2013. The version released by the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation in 2021 by ‘WVG Medien’ has a running time of 102 minutes."
(From Wikipedia https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracelsus_(Film) by machine translation).
Complete movie with English and Russian subtitles here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvRlBtvOk0E