UCLA

Cinematic Loss investigates the late Weimar Republic’s film legacy, which survives today in fragmentary form, and raises questions about how film historiography addresses absence. Taking a closer look at the final democratic years before the rise of Nazi rule, this study explores the works of German-speaking Jewish filmmakers in Germany from 1929 to 1933 and proposes systematic searches for their lost films in archives and private collections. The focus of film studies has traditionally been on narrative structure, cinematography, editing techniques, and mise-en-scene. Between 1980 and 1990, the archival turn in film studies redirected attention to broader historical, cultural, and institutional contexts. As a result of this shift and technological advancements, scholars can access archival resources more easily, making it easier to analyze missing films. By drawing on preservation debates, this project explores the challenges posed by ontological realism and proposes alternative approaches that consider the uncanniness and gaps inherent in historical discourse. Studying the dynamics between lost and found films highlights the extent of material decay and the potential for restoration. Examining ephemera, this project emphasizes their aesthetic value and broader perspectives beyond the films themselves. Cinematic Loss challenges the idea that ephemera should be considered a last resort in film analysis and emphasizes the importance of engaging with the medium of film in all its forms. Through a comprehensive research effort, this project contributed to the rediscovery of numerous lost films. An extensive search of international archives and private collections led to the discovery of a substantial number of missing films. Considering paper collections, sound elements, and images, among other crucial components, greatly facilitated the systematic search. A researcher’s ability to recognize and include cinematic absence as an object of study within their own work is essential to finding and recovering long-lost cinematic artifacts. One can only find something when one understands what one is looking for. Therefore, the inclusion of missing films into cultural histories facilitates their rediscovery, preservation and restoration by breaking the silence surrounding their existence. In addition to recovering films from the period, this work contextualizes them within their cultural milieu. Among the topics explored are the transition from silent to sound films, the notions of nationality and belonging, and the emergence of a transnational form of cinema in the early 1930s. Taking a closer look at these topics sheds light on the broader significance and implications of the recovered films. Moreover, the study discusses the efforts made by film archives, German government funding for preservation, and the importance of collaboration between archives and private collectors. Cinematic Loss discusses the challenges and methodologies involved in restoring lost films. It emphasizes the need to preserve ephemera and contextual information for future use by archivists and researchers alike. As a final component, this work contains a digital companion piece, the Weimar Talkies Project, which provides summaries and reviews of feature-length sound films from the Weimar Republic, which serve as a valuable research and educational resource. Through archival searches and critical research efforts, this work contributes to the revitalization of the Weimar Republic’s film legacy by engaging with the absence of historiography in film. Cinematic Loss sheds light on a crucial period in German cinema history and enriches our understanding of cultural artifacts from the past.