Cinema's exiles : from Hitler to Hollywood
(DVD)

Program content: ©2007; broadcast as a PBS television documentary in 2009.

Editor, Anny Lowery Meza ; composer, Peter Melnick ; cinematographers, Joan Churchill, Emil Fischhaber.

Narrator, Sigourney Weaver.

"When Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in 1933, one of his first actions was to ban Jews from working in that country's film industry, praised as the most creative cinema in the world. Men and women who had made landmarks of movie history fled their homeland in the ensuing months and years. Many went to Hollywood. This compelling documentary traces the experiences of the exiles who took refuge in Hollywood, and examines their impact on both the German and the American cinemas. In Germany they had created ground-breaking pictures such as The Cabinet Of Dr Who, Caligari, The Blue Angel and M-The Murderers Among Us. In Hollywood, their influence ranged from the horror genre and film noir, to comedy and drama. With their lush compositions, they changed the role of music in the motion picture. They even made Westerns. Included amongst more than 800 film professionals who escaped to Hollywood in the years between 1933 and 1939 were actors Felix Bressart, Hedy Lamarr and Peter Lorre; directors Fritz Land, Henry Koster, Billy Wilder and Fred Zinnerman ; composers Frederick Hollander, Hans Salter and Franz Waxman and cinematographer Rudy Mate. Not every exile found success in Hollywood. Most never regained the fame they had known in Europe." --,(Source of summary not specified)

TV Parental Guidelines rating: TV-PG.

DVD-R (might not be compatible with all players); full screen (1.37:1) presentation.