Women Are Better Diplomats

Women Are Better Diplomats (German: Frauen sind doch bessere Diplomaten) is a 1941 German musical comedy film from the Nazi era. Directed by Georg Jacoby and starring Marika Rökk, Willy Fritsch and Aribert Wäscher.^[1] It was based on a novel by Hans Flemming. The film was the first German feature film to be made in colour, and was one of the most expensive films produced during the Third Reich. The film met with a positive public response and was among the most popular German films of the early war years.

A dancer named Marie-Luise Pally is sent on a diplomatic mission to the Frankfurt Parliament in an attempt to stop her uncle's casino in Homburg shutting down. The film is set in the German revolutions of 1848–1849.^[2]

The production period for Women Are Better Diplomats was both long and expensive, as the production team encountered various difficulties during the making of the film. It took longer to produce than any other Universum Film AG (Ufa) production,^[3] with a gap of more than two years between the start of filming in July 1939 and its debut screening in October 1941.^[4] The delays prompted the cast to joke that "When the film is done, the war will be over too".^[5][6] These delays also increased the cost of the production. The original budget was 1.45 million ℛ︁ℳ︁,^[6] but the final production cost was actually 2.4 million ℛ︁ℳ︁,^[7] making it the thirteenth most expensive film produced during the Third Reich.^[3]

Many of the delays in production stemmed from the fact that Women Are Better Diplomats was the first German feature film to be shot in colour.^[8] The colour process used was Agfacolor, which had recently been developed as a German alternative to Technicolor.^[9] As filming in Agfacolor was still new, frequent improvements were made to the process during the film's production, prompting the re-shooting of scenes to enhance the reproduction of colours. Lead actress Marika Rökk recalled that "If we thought we had finished a scene, some revoltingly gifted technician would come up with an idea for improving it".^[5] Outdoor scenes were particularly problematic: one dance scene filmed in Babelsberg Park, for example, had to be re-filmed a number of times due to the grass appearing as blue or red rather than green, depending on the sun's position.^[10]

A further 500,000 ℛ︁ℳ︁ was added to the production cost when Karel Štěpánek, who had originally been cast for the part of Oberleutnant Keller, fled to London after the initial conclusion of filming and performed on radio there. This led to him being blacklisted by the Propaganda Ministry, and he had to be replaced by Erich Fiedler, with the relevant scenes being re-shot.^[4][6]

The film was one of many musical productions that featured a partnership between director Georg Jacoby and actress Marika Rökk. They had previously worked together on Hot Blood (1936), The Beggar Student (1936), Gasparone (1937) and A Night in May (1938). Jacoby and Rökk married each other in 1940, during the production of Women Are Better Diplomats.^[11]

The film's premiere was on 31 October 1941.^[5][6] Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels was not pleased with the results,^[12] but the film met with a positive public response. It was the third most popular film released in Germany between 1940 and 1942, behind Die Grosse Liebe (1942) and Wunschkonzert (1940).^[13] In the next three years, the film's takings were around 7.9 million ℛ︁ℳ︁.^[5]

Citations

Bibliography

• Ascheid, Antje (2003). Hitler's Heroines: Stardom and Womanhood in Nazi Cinema. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. ISBN 978-1-56639-984-5.
• Bock, Hans-Michael; Bergfelder, Tim (2009). The Concise Cinegraph: Encyclopaedia of German Cinema. Berghahn Books. ISBN 978-1-57181-655-9.
• Bruns, Jana Francesca (2002). Nazi Cinema's New Women: Marika Rokk, Zarah Leander, Kristina Soderbaum. Stanford University. ISBN 9780493628295.
• Cooke, Paul; Silberman, Marc (30 July 2010). Screening War: Perspectives on German Suffering. Camden House. ISBN 978-1-57113-437-0.
• Dalichow, Bärbel (2005). Babelsberg: Gesichter einer Filmstadt. Henschel. ISBN 978-3-89487-508-4.
• Fox, Jo (2000). Filming Women in the Third Reich. Berg. ISBN 978-1-85973-396-7.
• Haggith, Toby; Newman, Joanna Mary (2005). Holocaust and the Moving Image: Representations in Film and Television Since 1933. Wallflower Press. ISBN 978-1-904764-51-9.
• Kater, Michael H. (2000). "Review: Film as an Object of Reflection in the Goebbels Diaries: Series II (1941–1945)". Central European History. 33 (3). doi:10.1163/156916100746383. S2CID 144199049.
• Kreimeier, Klaus; Kimber, Robert; Kimber, Rita (1999). The Ufa Story: A History of Germany's Greatest Film Company, 1918–1945. University of California Press. p. 426. ISBN 978-0-520-22069-0.
• Zielinski, Siegfried (1999). Audiovisions: Cinema & Television As Entr'actes in History. Amsterdam University Press. ISBN 978-90-5356-313-7.

• Women Are Better Diplomats at IMDb