OTHER ANNEXED TERRITORIES FURTHER WEST
The ‘Eastern Cantons’ in search of German films
TEXT PRODUCED WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF PHILIPPE BECK
In Belgium, the cantons of Eupen, Malmedy and Saint-Vith – commonly known as the ‘Eastern Cantons’ – were also annexed to the Reich in 1940. This territory had long belonged to Prussia before being incorporated into Belgium after the First World War. A significant proportion of its population was German-speaking and culturally oriented towards the German-speaking world on the eve of the Second World War.
Before the war, the situation regarding movie theaters was already somewhat unusual: while Belgium was generally regarded as an extension of the French film market, the cantons of Eupen and Malmedy operated differently. With the emergence of talking films, local audience sought out mainly German-language films, which made cinema operators heavily dependent on German distributors, who were themselves controlled by the Ministry of Propaganda. The annexation didn’t bring about a clear break but served to reinforce this dominance of German films. Movie theaters were integrated into the German film market, and screenings took place in the same way as in the rest of Germany.
PHOTO N°79 (1-2) Nevertheless, films relating to war, propaganda or the story of the return to the Reich appeared to feature more prominently in local cinema program than in Strasbourg or Metz. The most striking example is Wunschkonzert, which topped the list of the most-watched films in Eupen. Behind the façade of a musical romance, this film – classified as a Staatsauftragsfilm (state-commissioned film) – highlighted the bond between soldiers at the front and the civilian population back home. Its local success shows that propaganda could reach a wide audience when presented as popular entertainment. In contrast, the film Wiener Blut (1942, Willi Forst), although widely screened in Alsace-Moselle, didn’t appeared in the cinema programs in the Eastern Cantons of Belgium. This omission is interesting because the Viennese comedy is set in the aftermath of the Congress of Vienna, where the borders of Europe were redrawn. It was at this time, in 1815, that the cantons of Eupen, Malmedy and Saint-Vith were assigned to Prussia. When fiction touches on history, the Nazis took care to avoid showing films that might be divisive, as was the case with films about the First World War, which were not screened in Moselle or Alsace.
Photo 92 : Deutsches Filminstitut & Filmmuseum – Photograph from Wiener Blut (1942, Willi Forst).
Photo 93 : Archives cinématographiques de l’est – A double-page spread from issue n°3166 of the magazine Illustrierter Film-kurier devoted to the film Wunschkonzert.