100 years 'Heimkino' for 17,5mm-film

 

by Martina Roepke and Henk Verheul at the Smalfilmmuseum/Hilversum in cooperation with AEI. Presentation at the annual meeting of AEI in Helsinki, november 2002

 

Introduction

In October 2002 a new project has been started at the Smalfilmmuseum in Hilversum. It aims is to provide access to and gain information about the very earliest amateurfilms made in Europe. It furthermore seeks out to stimulate exchange between academic scholars, archivists, curators and collectors working in this field in order to develop a perspective concerning the collection, restoration and presentation of early amateur films.

 

The project is dedicated to the 17,5mm-filmformat that was patented by the Heinrich-Ernemann A.G. in Dresden in 1902 and brought on the market in 1903. It was the first film format on the German market designed for amateur filmmakers exclusively and soon got popular outside Germany. Until the early teens of the last century Ernemanns' 17,5mm raw-film was used by wealthy amateurs to document moments of happiness within the realm of family life. But Ernemann also offered a range of professionally made 17,5mm films of varying content ready for home projection. Ernemanns 'Heimkino', then, has to be pictured as a succession of the most private and the most public scenes of those years brought together in one program.

 

Ernemanns early Heimkino for 17,5mm-film leaves us with a lot of interesting questions:

 

- How was smallfilm equipment used in this period?

- In what contexts were 17.5mm film shot and screened?

- What are the distinctions between professionalism and amateurism in this period?

- What categories do we need to describe the different activities in this field?

- What did the first Heimkino offer to it's spectators?

- How did Home Cinema relate to the public screenings of the medium?

- And how did it transform or adapt it's forms and contents?

 

This project attempts to reconstruct Ernemanns 'Heimkino'. We therefore try to contact European Archives as well as private collectors in order to locate as many 17,5mm-Ernemann films as possible, including both amateur and professional productions. Additionally, we are interested in any other documents related to early amateur filmmaking in general and the Ernemann-Kino in particular.

 

The first phase of the project is designed to run for two years.

In the first year, 2003, information will be gathered and discussions will be stimulated. We intend to contact different archives that are organized within the EAI as well as other archives and scholars working in this field. By this we expect to gain detailed descriptions of the earliest amateur films in Europe and information about the production, reception and circulation of amateurfilms during that period. In addition to that, questions of access and presentation of early amateurfilms will constantly be discussed and further developed.

 

In the second year, 2004, the evaluation of the material obtained will start. Scholars will be invited to comment on films and written sources, and the results will be published. Furthermore a proposal for conservation and/or edition of the films will be developed and presented at the EAA (European Access to amateurfilms, Luxemburg) and AEI (Association Europeenne Inedits) for further evaluation.

In 2005 we will start the dissemination of films and articles on Ernemann in order to stimulate further research and contacts.

 

The beginning: Early Home Cinema

What is it that those early films can tell us about amateur filmmaking and home cinemain this period and what questions do they raise about amateur filmmaking and home cinema in general?

 

According to a widely held view the function of private film is to provide a future memory. With private films, we assume, people capture what matters to them and what they want to remember later on.

 

However, if one looks at the actual amateur filmmaking practice in the early years, we think one has to revise this idea at least partly. What was to be seen in the early Home Cinema apparently did not serve the exclusive function of providing a memory. If one views those films there are two things to be noticed: First of all, among the films shown in early Home Cinema were not only scenes from "private" or "family"-occasions, but also scenes from public events or curious little humorous sketches. An example may be a film restored by the Smalfilmmuseum Hilversum dated approximately 1905, showing a fair with acrobats and artists. But secondly, the way in which family scenes were staged in early amateur films are very often less 'authentic' and natural than we assume. In a collection of early amateur films in the Filmmuseum Frankfurt, for instance we can see the family Neubronner staging little scenes and acrobatic sketches in front of the camera to amuse themselves and their guests.

 

It was material like this, found in different archives in Europe, that made us start thinking about those early years of Home Cinema as a practice beyond authenticity and memory. Rather than meant to show an 'authentic' image, those films most strikingly offer different glimpses of an ongoing process of staging - staging oneself and the world around - in front of the camera. This lead us to a new perspective on both, the amateurfilmpractice(s) in general and the films in particular. Central to this new perspective is the idea of the context in which these films were historically embedded: the 'program'.

 

The framework: programs as contexts

Programs were the original viewing context of the films in those years, in the public as well as in the private sphere. As they were very short, the program arranged the films within a larger whole, that aimed to appeal to its spectators with a variety of different themes and modes of representation. If we try to account for this historical fact, private films - as any films of that time - can be seen as fragments of a program, remnants of the original viewing context they were part of. Reconstructing early Home Cinema as a reconstruction of early Home Cinema programs, then, is the idea this project relies on.

 

Early private films are fragments, which lack their original context. They are 'orphans' which have been forgotten by film historiography for a long time. About them we know almost nothing and our methods to come to an understanding soon prove to be very limited. One way, however, to gain access to those films' meaning is to re-position them in relation to other films of the time. By reconstructing programs, the individual film is put in a network of relations with the other films included in the program-context. Look for instance at the contrast between the well-to-do family in the Hilversum-example on the one hand and the family's clownesque behavior as we can see it in the Films of Julius Neubronner on the other hand. Or look at the relation between space and action: the intimacy of the family-scenes and the public action in the 17,5mm fairground-film. And do not miss the similarities between films so different in their origins: both the ape on the fairground and the little boy in his home-garden staging acrobatic numbers in front of the camera.

 

There are two important conclusion to draw from all of this: working in the field of early amateur film, we need to widen our perspective from the individual film to the programs that functioned as its possible/virtual context. And: In reconstructing early Home Cinema as a film program we have to step across the line between 'amateurism' and 'professionalism' and enlarge the body of films to be considered. This means: all films that were produced on 17,5mm film, whether they were family-, ethnographic- or commercially produced funny-films films, will of major interest to this project.

 

The case-study: Ernemann

How then to study Home cinema programs, considering the fact that there are so few of these films left, not enough to count as each others "contexts"? What we want to do is to reconstruct a virtual Home Cinema program, starting with the first film program for amateurs that appeared in Germany and was provided by the Firma Ernemann in Dresden.

 

The 'Kino' - as it was called - was brought on the market in 1903 by the Heinrich Ernemann-A.G. in Dresden. The apparatus for 17,5mm could be used for shooting, developing and projection. In the little booklet, that was purchased together with the Kino, Ernemann promoted film as the surplus of realism in that the moving image could capture the expression of the human face more effectively, more realistically, than the "dead" photography. But Ernemanns' Kino was meant to be more than 'living photography': a real Home Cinema, where people could screen films that they had chosen from a catalogue. This meant that Ernemann-amateurs did not have to rely on their own films, but could actually enrich their programs with a whole range of different films. As a matter of fact: Ernemann sold films for home use very much like we buy home-videos today. By this a program-context was offered, that was known to the contemporary customers through the mediums' public screenings: Acrobatic scenes or ethnographical films, "funny" scenes and even erotic films, not recommended for family exposure. In 1903 only 9 films 3 to 12 minutes long were listed in the manual, but a separate film list that appeared in 1905 already contained the description of 125 films. What becomes obvious here is, that the Ernemann-Kino provided a program that counted on variety rather than on the ritualised repetition of the same family events, as Home Cinema is often pictured today. This program did not serve the family-memory exclusively but was also and most importantly intended to provide a specific sort of cinematic entertainment in the home, with 'remembrance' being just one possible effect to the spectators among others.

 

The described circulation-practice leaves us with another interesting insight: The Ernemann-amateur was not locked up in the private sphere. As a matter of fact, Ernemann encouraged amateurs to contribute with their own productions to the program. Some of the titles in the catalogue referring to family events, then, can be seen as indication of the fact, that the border line between 'amateur' and 'professional' use of the medium was at that time very permeable. Amateurs did participate in the public circulation of films, and some probably even earned money with this, too.

 

The idea of the first Home Cinema did, however, not prove to be successful. The distribution of 17,5mm-films for the Heimkino was stopped in 1907. The equipment was produced until ca. 1913. From 1912 on film screenings in the Home became popular with Pathé-Kok in France and Edison's Home Kinetoscope in the US. But in Germany the pioneer work of Ernemann did not find a successor. It was only in the thirties that amateur filmmaking in the sense of Home Cinema again achieved a wider popularity.

 

The virtual program of Ernemanns Heimkino can best be studied starting with the catalogue that Ernemann purchased. It gives us a list of filmtitles available for home use a the time, combining 'amateur-productions' with professionally produced an copied films. All 17,5mm- Ernemannfilms to be found here, are therefore seen as potential part of the virtual program in which all of those films could be related with each other. Our investigation of programs, then, would in a virtual program, to be created by the films discovered in different places in Europe. It would allow us give them meaning by putting them in relation with one another. A close investigation of the Ernemann-film-program would therefore provide us with a better understanding of private filmpractices within European homes before Worldwar I.

 

Conclusion

The project described above can actually be seen as a part and a starting point for the yet to be written history of early European amateur filmmaking and home cinema based on the conservation and accessibility of the material left from this time. Only if a network of scholars, archivists, and collectors can be established, this project will be successful. In order to make it start, the cooperation among different institutions will be required. Our experiences as both, curator and scholar working in this field will help us to quickly built up the infrastructure needed. In order to support this process and make the information obtained accessible as soon as possible a web-page has been created which will be updated regularly.

 

We undertake this attempt as a 'birthday-present' for the Ernemann-Kino and would love to arouse your enthusiasm for it. We hope that this project will increase public interest for the oldest amateur films we have in Europe, and that this will - result in other projects of this kind and of course - financial support for this kind of activities.

 

Martina Roepke, Utrecht

Henk Verheul, Hilversum