Saturday, October 22, 2016

Louise Brooks Oddities #5

In my ongoing research, I come across all sorts of material which is a little odd or unusual, and sometimes entertaining. Here is something I found a few days ago. It is a mention of Louise Brooks and Pandora's Box in a 1943 Nazi publication, Kladderadatsch, filled with anti-Jewish and anti-American propaganda. The best I can tell, Pandora's Box is referenced in the service of a joke. 

See the short piece below titled "Der Jagdfilm." It reads:

"Lange bevor man beschloss, Wedekinds Buchse der Pandora mit Louise Brooks zu drehen, kam ein Schriftsteller zu einem Munchner Filmproduzenten und sagte: 'Herr Direktor, ich habe eine ausgezeichnete Idee. Konnte man nicht mal Die Buchse der Pandora verfilmen?'

Der grosse Filmmann sah ihn an, wiegte den Kopf him und her, dann meinte er: Buchse der Pandora? Garnicht schlecht. Jagdfilme gehen bei uns in Baiern immer!"

If anyone can offer a translation or interpretation of this piece, it would appreciated.


I also found a couple of Charlie Chaplin cartoons in this issue of Kladderadatsch. Here is one of them. It is an anti-Chaplin cartoon, with the punchline being "Charlie Chaplin cannot sit idly by as his double go off to war."


Here is the other, a two page spread. I am not sure what it is about, but it seems anti-Semitic. (Chaplin, who was anti-Nazi, was said to be Jewish by Nazi propagandists.)


No comments:

Powered By Blogger