Filmkritik (magazine)

Filmkritik (magazine)
Title	Filmkritik
Category	Film magazine
Firstdate	1954
Finaldate	2001
Country	West Germany; Germany
Language	German

Filmkritik (magazine) was a German film periodical founded in 1954 that played a central role in postwar West Germany film criticism, engaging with international movements such as French New Wave, Italian Neorealism, and debates around Auteur theory. It connected discourses from institutions like the Berlinale, the Cannes Film Festival, and the Venice Film Festival to critical practice in publications alongside titles like Sight & Sound, Cahiers du cinéma, and Positif. The journal fostered relationships with filmmakers including Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Werner Herzog, and Fritz Lang while dialoguing with scholars at universities such as the Humboldt University of Berlin and the Free University of Berlin.

History

Filmkritik emerged in 1954 amid reconstruction debates in West Germany, intersecting with cultural politics involving the Allied occupation of Germany, the Frankfurt School, and the re-establishment of institutions like the Deutsches Filminstitut. Early issues responded to retrospectives at the Berlinale and programming at the Filmmuseum München while engaging with festivals including Locarno Festival and Rotterdam Film Festival. Throughout the 1960s the magazine intersected with student movements exemplified by the German student movement of 1968 and cultural critics from venues such as the Akademie der Künste. During the 1970s and 1980s it covered auteurist controversies involving figures like Jean-Luc Godard, Andrei Tarkovsky, and Akira Kurosawa, adapting to shifts after German reunification in 1990 and debates at the European Film Academy. Publication ceased in 2001 after editorial and financial pressures comparable to broader changes affecting titles like Film Comment and Kinema.

Editorial profile and philosophy

The magazine maintained a theoretical orientation rooted in dialogues with Sergei Eisenstein, Béla Balázs, and the textual analyses practiced by critics associated with Cahiers du cinéma and the British Film Institute. Its philosophy combined close readings influenced by Roland Barthes and Theodor W. Adorno with a commitment to auteurist evaluation akin to discussions around François Truffaut and Andrew Sarris. Filmkritik positioned itself between historical scholarship produced at institutions like the Deutsche Kinemathek and polemical pages inhabited by counterparts such as Film Comment; editors debated questions raised by films from Ingmar Bergman, Orson Welles, and Satyajit Ray while addressing technological shifts from 35 mm film to early digital formats and programming trends at festivals like Sundance Film Festival.

Contributors and editorial staff

Contributors included critics and scholars who also worked at universities such as the University of Cologne, the University of Hamburg, and the University of Munich, and who wrote monographs on directors including Fritz Lang, Luchino Visconti, and Billy Wilder. Editorial staff featured figures engaged with publications like Die Zeit and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, and collaborated with curators from the Museum of Modern Art film department and the British Film Institute. Guest contributors ranged from filmmakers such as Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Werner Herzog to theorists associated with the Centre Pompidou and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science.

Content and notable issues

Typical issues combined reviews of contemporary releases at events including the Cannes Film Festival and the Berlin International Film Festival with archival pieces on classics like Metropolis, retrospective dossiers on movements such as Italian Neorealism and German Expressionism, and interviews with auteurs including Jean Renoir, Carl Theodor Dreyer, and Akira Kurosawa. Notable themed issues examined topics tied to the New German Cinema movement and personalities like Werner Herzog and Rainer Werner Fassbinder, while special dossiers addressed censorship cases akin to controversies surrounding The Last Temptation of Christ and exhibition policies mirrored in debates at institutions such as the Bundeskulturstiftung (Federal Cultural Foundation of Germany). The magazine ran critical essays on film theory influenced by André Bazin and empirical histories comparable to projects at the Deutsches Filminstitut.

Reception and influence

Filmkritik was influential among critics, programmers, and scholars, cited alongside journals like Screen and Cahiers du cinéma in discussions at the European Network for Cinema and Media Studies. Its positions shaped programming at the Berlinale and retrospectives at museums such as the Cinémathèque Française and the Deutsche Kinemathek, and informed debates around auteurs like F.W. Murnau and Carl Theodor Dreyer. The magazine's critical stances provoked responses from filmmakers, festival directors, and academic conferences at institutions like the Free University of Berlin and the Humboldt University of Berlin, and influenced later German-language journals and publishing houses including Suhrkamp Verlag.

Publication details and circulation

Published in German, the magazine circulated primarily in West Germany and later united Germany, with distribution channels overlapping those of cultural periodicals like Die Zeit and Der Spiegel. Circulation figures fluctuated amid broader media shifts that affected titles such as Film Comment and were impacted by funding patterns connected to bodies like the Kulturstiftung des Bundes and regional film funds such as the Filmförderungsanstalt. Frequency varied over decades as editors negotiated budgets, printing technologies, and partnerships with festivals including the Berlinale and the Munich Film Festival.

Legacy and archives

The magazine's archives, including editorial files, contributor correspondence, and back issues, are preserved in collections at institutions like the Deutsches Filminstitut, the Deutsche Kinemathek, and university libraries such as those of the University of Cologne and the Free University of Berlin. Its legacy endures in scholarly references in works published by presses such as Cambridge University Press and Oxford University Press, in film curricula at the University of Oxford and the Sorbonne, and in the continuing influence on programming at festivals like Berlinale and Cannes Film Festival.

Category:German film magazines Category:Defunct magazines of Germany