WRITING ABOUT THE CINEMA - A recommendation for THE DIRECTOR by Daniel Kehlman

G W Pabst was, for a decade or so through the late silent period and into the early sound period, held in the highest esteem. His silent films still get attention today, most especially the two films he made in 1929 with Louise Brooks Pandora's Box and Diary of a Lost Girl.  and there is the curiosity of The White Hell of Pitz Palu, co-directed with Arnold Fanck and starring Leni Riefenstahl. His first three sound films Westfront 1918, The Threepenny Opera and Kameradschaft are still available in splendid Criterion editions (as is Pandora's Box).

G W Pabst

In 1934 he had gone to Hollywood but his only American film A Modern Hero was a flop and he headed back to Europe partly to take care of his sick mother. He was trapped in Nazi Germany when war broke out and made two films The Comedians (1941) and Paracelsus (1943). The latter film was of sufficient interest that it was released in New York in 1974, seven years after Pabst's death, for some limited screenings. It actually attracted a review by Vincent Canby in The New York Times who advised "Paracelsus," considering when it was made (1943) and under what conditions, is a remarkably interesting film, though full of not especially well disguised propaganda".

Daniel Kehlman's novel about Pabst's life and work, "The Director", focuses mostly on the other film that Pabst may or may not have made during WW2. Wikipedia gives a succinct summary: "The Molander Case (German: Der Fall Molander) is a 1945 German drama film directed by Georg Wilhelm Pabst. The movie is based on the novel Die Sternengeige by Alfred Karrasch. On August 28, 1944, Pabst started shooting the movie for Terra Film.^[1] As shooting had just been completed at the Barrandov Studios in Prague and editing had already begun, Prague was liberated by the Red Army and Pabst was forced to abandon the work. The film is considered lost."

Which gives Kehlman a lot of room to speculate on the conditions of production and the rambunctious nature of Pabst's private life at the time when the film was being made. He also speculates that Pabst never got over making two films, and possibly having a brief affair, with Louise Brooks. He also surmises that Brooks had no time at all for Pabst when he got to Hollywood.

Whether or not Kehlman invented the use of concentration camp inmates as extras and whether the story of the efforts to get the film to a safe place are in any way authentic, it's a rattling good read and has deservedly got a lot of serious critical attention.  This includes an adulatory review by Peter Craven, which is likely behind a paywall, in the Melbourne Age.

Louise Brooks, Pandora's Box

It makes me want to have a look especially at those early thirties sound films. The Threepenny Opera will be for starters.