134 | Mass Media and Historical Change
more. The withdrawal from the German market occurred rather on the basis
of economics, as censorship, quota regulations and the currency differential
harboured financial risks (ibid.: 331–34). Leading National Socialists valued
American films as community-building models. Of course, these were success-
ful primarily in the cities, since cinemagoers in rural areas and working-class
neighbourhoods preferred German films (Führer in Führer and Ross 2008:
98–108). Only when it became clear that German films could not compete
internationally were stronger restrictions on U.S. productions enforced at the
end of the 1930s, and in 1940 they were completely prohibited. There were
similar tendencies in Italy and Spain, where Hollywood had celebrated even
greater triumphs into the 1930s, after which a renationalisation of cinema was
enforced. Subsidies, quotas and the promotion of young talents strengthened
the domestic movie industry, in Italy especially.
War and occupation gave the German film industry access to new, often
enforced markets in both allied and occupied territories. The National Social-
ists used movies in their attempts to broadcast their ideology into occupied
countries, which had hardly any means of defending against this (Kreimeier
1992: 331–41). Yet the export of films met with only moderate success: in
nearly every country viewers preferred their own movies and newsreels (Vande
Winkel and Welch 2007). Only in Italy were some German films marketed on
the basis of an agreement, and Germany became the main country of export
for Italian productions, but further plans for cooperation in the ‘German–
Italian Film Union’ came to nothing. Among neutral countries it was especially
Switzerland that showed German newsreels and movies, in part because they
produced too few of their own. Yet the hoped-for film hegemony of Germany
as the ‘Hollywood of Europe’ was certainly not achieved.
A pivotal role in propaganda was played by the newsreels, which had
been shown before the main feature since the 1910s and are very accessi-
ble sources today (circa 6,000 newsreels at: http://www.wochenschau-archiv.de)..)
Because of their propagandistic potential, documentaries preceding the
main film were compulsory in Italy as of 1926, the more so as newspa-
pers and radio reached only small segments of the population. Germany
followed suit in 1938 with mandatory newsreels as well, which, like pic-
torials, contained glorified depictions of the party elite, the vaunted mod-
ernisation of the country, and entertainment news on sports, daily life and
fashion (Bartels 2004: 279f.). Pride of place was given to musically enhanced
visual impressions, with hardly any factual information being communi-
cated by the speaker. Besides the German newsreels from Ufa, Bavaria/
Tobis and Deulig, the American FOX newsreel also maintained a presence
in the 1930s. As had been the case with the motion picture, this was pur-
chased at the cost of accommodation. All newsreels were finally centralised
in 1940 in the ‘Deutsche Wochenschau’ (ibid.: 162). FOX newsreels and the