13 July 2008
"Elisabeth" update
13/07/08 07:21 Filed in: In Production
Things are moving along well, if not slightly behind schedule, for “Elisabeth of Berlin.” The edit has now reached Act III, the point in any film where the tension and action comes together to form a climax. This should be an enjoyable piece to edit.
One very pleasing aspect of the past few weeks’ work is that I was able to assemble a segment that I was afraid would not work. In the earliest discussions about the content of the film, Manfred Gailus and I felt the need to work in the conflict between Karl Barth and Adolf Von Harnack in the 1920s. It’s a key piece, since Elisabeth Schmitz bridges them, being a student of both. But how to do this for an American audience? Theological debates rarely make good TV. But Harnack so totally lost the debate that history doesn’t take him too seriously. Barth clearly won the day.
Well, the viewers will be the judge, but I was able to put together seven minutes of Elisabeth Schmitz’s early formation that includes her sitting at the feet of both Harnack and Barth while never renouncing the thought of either one. It fits nicely into the film as an introduction to Act III, where we will go to Kristallnacht and experience her response to it and her years of sheltering Jews before she left Berlin for Hanau in 1943.
Stay tuned!
One very pleasing aspect of the past few weeks’ work is that I was able to assemble a segment that I was afraid would not work. In the earliest discussions about the content of the film, Manfred Gailus and I felt the need to work in the conflict between Karl Barth and Adolf Von Harnack in the 1920s. It’s a key piece, since Elisabeth Schmitz bridges them, being a student of both. But how to do this for an American audience? Theological debates rarely make good TV. But Harnack so totally lost the debate that history doesn’t take him too seriously. Barth clearly won the day.
Well, the viewers will be the judge, but I was able to put together seven minutes of Elisabeth Schmitz’s early formation that includes her sitting at the feet of both Harnack and Barth while never renouncing the thought of either one. It fits nicely into the film as an introduction to Act III, where we will go to Kristallnacht and experience her response to it and her years of sheltering Jews before she left Berlin for Hanau in 1943.
Stay tuned!