1917 Austro-Hungarian film
Heldenkampf in Schnee und Eis ("Heroes' Fight in Snow and Ice") is a 1917 Austro-Hungarian propaganda newsreel film made by Sascha-Film for the Imperial and Royal War Press Headquarters. The film is hand-coloured and presented in two sections, with a total running time of 49 minutes 50 seconds.
Background.
The creator of "Heldenkampf in Schnee und Eis" remains unknown, but it may have been the work of the cameraman and later director Gustav Ucicky. At that time, film was still a very new form of propaganda. "Ein Heldenkampf in Schnee und Eis" consists of exterior shots on the Alpine front in Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol, where battles were being fought in the mountains at 2,000 to 3,000 meters. These offered an opportunity for each side to portray its soldiers as heroes, the fight in snow and ice demonstrating strength and superiority over the enemy and allowing each side to emphasise the effectiveness of its own weapons and warfare. A silent film, it had title cards between shots as was normal, but was presented without musical accompaniment in the cinema, which was unusual.
Action.
Scenes in section two.
The soldiers' thirst for action can be seen from the last text overlay. An enemy base has only just been stormed, and you can already look into the distance at the firns and peaks, where the main enemy positions are. Like the beginning of the film, the last shot is a mountain shot.
Criticism.
The distinction between fiction and documentary film was still unclear at the time the film was made, and it was common to take multiple images and cut them in quick succession. The film departed from the normal rules of the war press headquarters. It obviously shows the exhausted, unmotivated faces of the fighters, the endless expanses of the mountains and impassible snow. It did not seek to contribute to strengthening the nation's self-confidence as an ordinary propaganda film might, but showed the limits of strength and endurance. The film included scenes apparently shot from behind both Austrian and Italian lines, including some identifiable as having been shown before, so did not consist of entirely new and documentary camerawork. It included some scenes previously shown in "Beim Johannesfall in den Radstätter Tauern" (1917) made by the same studio.
References.
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