June 13, 2020

Years and movies: 1943

The best film of world cinema in 1943 according to FilmGourmand recognized the film of Danish filmmaker Carl Theodor Dreyer "Vredens dag (Day of Wrath)".

The birth of this film is perfectly illustrated by the famous Russian proverb "it would be happiness, but misfortune helped."

In the 30s, a stream of color entertainment films from the United States, France, and the United Kingdom poured into little Denmark. The Danish film industry has been uncompetitive. Carl Theodor Dreyer, as the author of serious, philosophical films, was unclaimed and in 1936 was forced to return to his original profession - to journalism.

Initially, as an eminent film Director, he was tasked with writing reviews of films entering the Danish film market. But, like most filmmakers, he was more than critical of other people's work. As a result, his reviews did not so much attract moviegoers as, on the contrary, scare them away. Soon, just 4 months later, Dreyer was transferred to another direction: he began to write reports from the courtroom. For 5 years, he prepared more than 1,000 reports, each of which the public was waiting with great impatience, as a continuation of a fashionable exciting novel.

But the Nazi occupation changed everything dramatically. The German occupation authorities banned film production from the United States, France, Britain and their allies. There was a sharp demand for films produced inside Denmark. And this circumstance was most opportunely Dreyer. Thanks to the national disaster, Dreyer was able to return to the Director's chair and realize a long-cherished idea - to make a film based on the play by Norwegian writer Hans Wiers-Jenssen "Anne Pedersdotter". The film was called "Day of Wrath".

For obvious reasons (Nazi occupation, World War II) initially, only Danish and Norwegian moviegoers were able to see the film. And only after the end of the war, the film was seen by viewers of other countries. But the film could not fully participate in any international film festivals: after all, it was made, as they say, "in the occupied territory".

However, the Danish patriots tried to see in the film witch hunt of XVII-XVIII centuries allegory of the Nazi persecution of Jews. But Dreyer himself denied it all his life, claiming that his film has no connection with modern political processes.

Not being a participant in the competitive programs of any film festivals, the film, however, received very favorable reviews from film critics. In particular, Criterion Collection spoke about the creation of Dreyer: "Filmed during the Nazi occupation of Denmark, Carl Dreyer’s Day of Wrath is a harrowing account of individual helplessness in the face of growing social repression and paranoia. Anna, the young second wife of a well-respected but much older pastor, falls in love with her stepson when he returns to their small seventeenth-century village. Stepping outside the bounds of the village’s harsh moral code has disastrous results. Exquisitely photographed and passionately acted, Day of Wrath remains an intense, unforgettable experience."

According to FilmGourmand, "Day of Wrath" has a rating of 8,034 and ranks 668th in the Golden Thousand.

In addition to Dreyer's "Day of wrath", the following films are included in the top ten films of 1943 according to FilmGourmand:


- The Raven by Henri-Georges Clouzot, France. Movie's Rating - 7,865; 903rd Rank in the Golden Thousand
- Два бойца (Two Soldiers) by Leonid Lukov, USSR
- Shadow of a Doubt by Alfred Hitchcock, USA.
- Sahara by Zoltan Korda, USA
- Насреддин в Бухаре (Adventures in Bokhara) by Yakov Protazanov, USSR
- Obsession by Luchino Visconti, Italy
- This Land Is Mine by Jean Renoir, USA
- Жди меня (Wait for Me) by Boris Ivanov and Aleksandr Stolper, USSR
- Lassie Come Home by Fred M. Wilcox, USA

10 most "cinegenic"*, in our opinion, events of 1943:


- A radical turning point in the war. During the Great Patriotic war, which continued in the Soviet Union, the Red army inflicted a number of crushing defeats on the German armed forces: it liquidated the blockade of Leningrad, forced field Marshal Paulus' 6th army to capitulate at Stalingrad, and stopped the Wehrmacht's offensive at Kursk. The consequence of these victories was a fundamental change in the Great Patriotic war and in the World War II as a whole, after which Germany finally lost its strategic initiative.
- Volhynian massacre. Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) during the so-called Volhynian massacre tortured, mutilated and murdered, according to the most modest estimates, more than 100 thousands Poles living in the territory of northwestern Ukraine.
- Warsaw Uprising. In Poland, an anti-fascist uprising broke out in the Warsaw ghetto. Less than a month later, the uprising was brutally crushed by SS units.
- Khatyn. For killing by partisans of the police captain and Olympic champion Hans Valkё on the orders of the commander of the punitive battalion Dirlewanger Ukrainians headed by Gregory Vasyura burned alive the population of the Belarusian village of Khatyn - 149 people, including 75 children.
- Koryukivka massacre. In response to the guerrilla operation to liberate 97 suicide hostages, SS forces together with Ukrainian collaborators and soldiers of the Hungarian 105th Light Division committed the most extensive punitive action of the Second World War, the Koryukivka massacre. 6,700 civilians of the Ukrainian village of Koryukivka were shot and burned.
- Conference in Casablanca. Franklin D. Roosevelt, US President; Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom; Generals Charles de Gaulle and Henri Giraud of the Free French met secretly at the Anfa Hotel in Casablanca, Morocco to plan the Allied European strategy for the next phase of the war.
- Tehran conference. A conference of the leaders of the three allied powers in World War II took place in Tehran (Iran): the USSR (J. Stalin), the USA (F. Roosevelt) and Great Britain (W. Churchill).
- The death of the "White Rose". In Germany, leaders of the anti-Nazi organization "White Rose" Christoph Probst, Hans and Sophie Scholl were executed.
- Military coup in Argentina. Civilian President Ramon Castillo deposed by junta led by Juan Peron.
- Italy's surrender. Allied forces landed in Sicily. Benito Mussolini is arrested. Italy surrendered and went over to the side of the anti-Hitler coalition.

Besides Catherine Deneuve, Hanna Schygulla were born.

* -With "cinematic" in the present context, we mean events that either have already found their reflection in world cinema, or deserve to become the basis of the plot of a future film.