Film
The City Without Jews
- Director
- Hans Karl Breslauer
- Certificate
- PG
- Running Time
- 80 mins
Way back in 1924, the Nazi party was still banned and Adolf Hitler was incarcerated in a Bavarian prison cell, where he was completing Mein Kampf. But this extraordinary piece of Austrian silent cinema foresaw what was going to happen. In a provincial German city after the end of WWI, inflation is rocketing and the residents are turning on one another. Clearly, a scapegoat is needed and it’s not long before the chancellor demands the explusion of all Jews.
Based on a dystopian novel by the Jewish publicist Hugo Bettauer (who was himself assassinated by an ex-member of Nazi party shortly after the premiere), the film proved hugely controversial and was heavily censored. It subsequently vanished and was thought lost altogether for nearly a century until a chance discovery in a Parisian fleamarket. It’s now been fully restored. This South West Silents screening is the first showing outside London. There will be live piano accompaniment by John Sweeney.
is needed now More than ever
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