Abstract
The article analyzes three little-known films from the early 1930s which are based on novels by British crime thriller writer Edgar Wallace. It presents the films and their genre as a case study for crime cinema and politics in the transition from the Weimar Republic to Nazi Germany by contextualizing them within the rapidly changing film market after January 1933. The series of popular Weimar Wallace films ended abruptly with Hitler’s rise to power, which also put a stop to most of the country’s transnational cinema practices, including film adaptations of novels which were then considered as un-German.
Works Cited
Barthel, Manfred (1986). So war es wirklich: Der deutsche Nachkriegsfilm. München: Herbig.Search in Google Scholar
Bergfelder, Tim (2002). “Extraterritorial Fantasies: Edgar Wallace and the German Crime Film.” Tim Bergfelder, Erica Carter, and Deniz Göktürk, eds. The German Cinema Book. London: British Film Institute, 39–47.Search in Google Scholar
Bergfelder, Tim (2006). International Adventures: German Popular Cinema and European Co-Productions in the 1960s. New York, NY: Berghahn.Search in Google Scholar
Blödorn, Andreas (2007). “Stilbildung und visuelle Kodierung im Film: Am Beispiel der deutschen Edgar Wallace-Filme der 1960er Jahre und ihrer Parodie in Der Wixxer.” KODIKAS/CODE, Ars Semeiotica 30.1–2, 137–152.Search in Google Scholar
Deutsches Filminstitut DIF e.V. “Verbotene Bilder, manipulierte Filme (I+II): Zur Edition der Zensurentscheidungen der Berliner Film-Oberprüfstelle aus den Jahren 1920 bis 1938.” <http://www.difarchiv.deutsches-filminstitut.de/zengut/df2tb501z.pdf> (20 June 2018).Search in Google Scholar
Gerhards, Sascha (2013). “Ironizing Identity: The German Crime Genre and the Edgar Wallace Production Trend of the 1960s.” Jaimey Fisher, ed. Generic Histories of German Cinema: Genre and its Deviations. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 133–155.Search in Google Scholar
Glover, David (2003). “The Thriller.” Martin Priestman, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Crime Fiction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 135–153.10.1017/CCOL0521803993.009Search in Google Scholar
Goebbels, Joseph (1998). Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels Online. Ed. Elke Fröhlich. Berlin, Boston, MA: De Gruyter. <http://www.degruyter.com/view/db/tjgo> (20 June 2018).Search in Google Scholar
Horch, Franz (1930). Die Spielpläne Max Reinhardts 1905–1930. München: Piper.Search in Google Scholar
Horsley, Lee (2009). The Noir Thriller. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.10.1057/9780230280755Search in Google Scholar
Jerven, Walte (1932). “Der Hexer.” Film-Kurier 172. <http://www.filmportal.de/material/der-hexer-0> (20 June 2018).Search in Google Scholar
Knight, Stephen (2004). Crime Fiction, 1800–2000: Detection, Death, Diversity. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Search in Google Scholar
Kracauer, Siegfried (2011 [1932]). “Edgar Wallace †.” Inka Mülder-Bach, ed. Siegfried Kracauer: Essays, Feuilletons, Rezensionen. Band 5.4 1932–1965. Berlin: Suhrkamp, 37–39.Search in Google Scholar
Kracauer, Siegfried (2004 [1947]). From Caligari to Hitler: A Psychological History of the German Film. Princeton, NJ and Oxford: Princeton University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Kramp, Joachim, and Jürgen Wehnert (2004). Das Edgar Wallace Lexikon: Leben, Werk, Filme. Berlin: Schwarzkopf und Schwarzkopf.Search in Google Scholar
McFarlane, Brian (1996). Novel to Film: An Introduction to the Theory of Adaptation. Oxford: Clarendon.Search in Google Scholar
Munby, Jonathan (1999). Public Heroes: Screening the Gangster from Little Caesar to Touch of Evil. London and Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.10.7208/chicago/9780226550343.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
O’Brien, Mary-Elizabeth (2006). Nazi Cinema as Enchantment: The Politics of Entertainment in the Third Reich. Rochester, NY: Camden House.Search in Google Scholar
Pauer, Florian (1982). Die Edgar-Wallace-Filme. München: Goldmann.Search in Google Scholar
“Reichsgesetzblatt (RGBl.)” ALEX: Historische Rechts- und Gesetzestexte Online. <http://alex.onb.ac.at/tab_dra.htm> (14 June 2015).Search in Google Scholar
“Reichsministerialblatt (RMBl).” 1930.Search in Google Scholar
Späth, Eberhard (1986). “Some Remarks on the Success of Edgar Wallace in Germany.” Anglistentag 8, 100–112.Search in Google Scholar
Traber, Bodo (2012). “Die besten Edgar Wallace Krimis. Der Zinker (1931), Der Hexer (1932), Der Doppelgänger (1934). 3 DVDs. Rosengarten: Spirit Media 2011/Der Hund von Baskerville (1936). DVD. Rosengarten: Spirit Media 2010.” Filmblatt 48, 69–70.Search in Google Scholar
Truffaut, François (1985). Hitchcock. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster.Search in Google Scholar
Tses, Christos (2002). Der Hexer, der Zinker und andere Mörder: Hinter den Kulissen der Edgar-Wallace-Filme. Essen: Klartext.Search in Google Scholar
Žižek, Slavoj, ed. (1992). Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Lacan (But Were Afraid to Ask Hitchcock). London, New York, NY: Verso.Search in Google Scholar
Films:Search in Google Scholar
Blackmail (1929). Dir. Alfred Hitchcock. Berlin: Studiocanal, 2013. DVD.Search in Google Scholar
Der Zinker (1931). Dir. Karel Lamač and Martin Frič. Planegg: Koch Media, 2010. DVD.Search in Google Scholar
Der Hexer (1932). Dir. Karel Lamač. Planegg: Koch Media, 2010. DVD.Search in Google Scholar
Der Doppelgänger (1934). Dir. E.W. Emo. Planegg: Koch Media, 2010. DVD.Search in Google Scholar
©2019 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
