Spio strips 14 movie greats of the Medal of Honor | EUROtoday

The main group of the movie trade (Spio) retroactively withdraws the medals of honor from 14 movie greats – together with Leni Riefenstahl, Heinz Rühmann and Olga Tschechowa. The set off is a research offered by the Institute for Contemporary History (IfZ) in Munich, which classifies former prize winners and spy leaders as “Nazi-affected” or “Nazi-compliant”.

The Spy Medal of Honor will due to this fact be subsequently revoked from 14 recipients, because the group introduced. These embrace, amongst others, the Nazi propaganda filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl, actor Heinz Rühmann, the previous Berlinale director Alfred Bauer, the director August Arnold, movie diva Olga Tschechowa and filmmaker Ludwig Waldleitner.

According to Spio, in a single distinctive case it was determined to not revoke the award: In the case of Hilmar Hoffmann, former head of the cultural division of the town of Frankfurt am Main, the IfZ scientists highlighted a particular function.

After 1945, all through his life, Hoffmann “effectively advocated for a critical examination of the Nazi past and set accents for an artistic counter-position to the National Socialist film legacy.” The Spio Presidium noticed this as proof that folks can change and study from errors in a crucial and self-reflective method and due to this fact selected a differentiated evaluation, it mentioned.

According to its personal statements, Spio commissioned the research on the Nazi previous towards the background of the group’s one hundredth anniversary and the present rise of right-wing extremist views inside society.

“Out of a deeply felt socio-political responsibility, the Spio has decided to have the Nazi past of the Spio’s management staff and the Medal of Honor recipients scientifically examined,” defined its President Peter Schauerte. “It was clear to us that we would be confronted with burdens from people from the past and our own mistakes. It was essential that the study had a scientifically sound basis in order to be able to draw appropriate conclusions.”

As an additional consequence, the Spio Medal of Honor will not be awarded in its present kind, the group introduced. Instead, a brand new prize is being created, the standards catalog of which is presently being developed. “In the future, this award will not only honor special achievements and merits for the film industry, but also explicitly the socio-political commitment to democracy and the rule of law,” it mentioned.

According to its personal statements, the umbrella group of the movie trade represents the pursuits of the German movie trade within the areas of movie manufacturing, movie distribution, movie theaters and audiovisual media. As an umbrella group of 14 skilled associations, it represents greater than 1,400 member corporations. The intention of Spio is to strengthen German movie in its range, high quality and worldwide notion and to make sure its competitiveness as an financial and cultural asset.