"Der Hauptmann von Köpenick" is, because of its Oscar nomination, definitely a contender for Heinz Rühmann's most known work. And it certainly is the most known movie by Helmut Käutner, who directed here and also adapted the literary work this is based on. And with Rühmann, the film got one of the most known German actors from that time, probably the number one. This 90-minute film is a pretty good example of how Rühmann transitioned more and more from pure comedy to pure drama, of course with how he also gives his subtly funny approach to his characters. However, I must say that even if I enjoyed the watch I would say agree with another reviewer who said that this is not among Rühmann's best performances and also not among his best films. I was not really that impressed here. There were some moments that were good of course and overall I also believe the good outweighs the bad, but an Academy Award nomination may have been a bit too much. Still the best thing about the film is the acting as the movie is a bit of style over substance in some other areas. All in all, a cautious thumbs-up from me. Oh yeah, final note, it is in color, which is not a given looking at how this was made 60 years ago. There were many black-and-white films from Germany from that era too.
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Horst_In_Translation10 June 2016
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MogwaiMovieReviews29 November 2020In a slight but well observed little fable about societal hierarchies, snobbery and injustice, Heinz Rühmann is fine as the ex-con who finds wearing a military uniform can get him everything otherwise hopelessly out of reach. It's a humorous tale, but there's nothing in it that will actually make you laugh, and it takes a whole hour to get to the interesting part of the story, which is much too long. It doesn't really add up to anything much but it's an agreeable enough watch, lovably capturing Old Europe in all its handsome grandeur and ridiculous pomposity, and shot with a good deal of character in early Eastmancolor.
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lrumery10 May 2003This is a great movie. Set in about 1910 in Prussia, a middle-aged shoemaker who has been in prison is in a catch-22 situation - he wants to leave to get work in Hungary, but can't get a passport. He can't get work because he doesn't have papers and can't get papers because he doesn't have work. The theme is really how the Germans of that time were so willing to follow senseless rules and figures of authority. The shoemaker buys a captain's uniform, commandeers a small troop of men, and tries to solve his problem by impersonating a captain. The actor playing Willem Voigt is wonderful - human and touching. Only problem is that the film is available on DVD but only from Germany, so I think it's not workable in our DVD machines.
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boblipton29 January 2023Based on a true story, this Oscar-nominated movie concerns itself with Heinz Ruhmann, an ex-con who wants to get back to work but finds himself frustrated with the German Empire's bureaucracy that makes him fall into cracks. Finally, in an effort to get a passport, he found an old uniform at a second-hand dealer's shop, bought it, wore it, and ordered soldiers to follow him to a town, where he orders everyone about with obedience to military orders drilled into seemingly every German.
Helmut Käutner's version of the oft-told tale has its moments of satire, but really, it's more a character study of Heinz Ruhmann's character, his sad frustration at dealing with the insanity of a perfect system, that decrees that you can't get a job without a lodging permit, you can't get a lodging permit without a job, and you can't get a passport to get out without.... well, whatever it is, it can't be done. The movie is shot through with humanity, from Edith Hancke's sick lodger, to Willy Kleinau as Ruhmann's brother-in-law, who takes care of his family, and bears up under the lack of concern that the German government treats him with, with an almost pious belief in the order of things.
It's not that the system is a bad one. It's that no system works. -
HuskyEnzo25 September 2006Germany 1910, after a true story ... In deepest prussian Germany at the beginning of the 20th century the shoemaker Wilhelm Voigt (Heinz Rühmann) is released from prison where he spent most of his lifetime. By nature never truly a bad guy but someone who kept over water by smalltime swindling he mostly got unlucky and repeatedly went to jail. Generally of good will he spent his time there working and learning everything he could. In a military influenced society and era like this the scholary-lessons were dominated by army knowledge which one would actually call meaningless for civil life. Particularly today everybody would fear any such knowledge in the hands of civilians as a basis for terrorist-actions.
Now on the edge to retirement Voigt gets his pardon and goes free, the law knows he's too old to commit serious crimes. Equipped only with the releasing paper of the Ministry Of Justice he tries to get back into life, eager to finish it as a decent working man. But the paper though stamped and typed by the legal authorities- ain't accepted nowhere as a passport and isn't even meant to be swapped into one, not even at any communal registration office. And without passport: no job! Without registered employment: no passport! A vicious circle... Weeks of unregistered residence later the order to leave the country hits Voigt like a nail to the temple. Desperate about the authorities oppression he roams the streets and comes to a pawn-shop. He spots an abandoned captain's uniform (which in this film has had an own interesting story) in the window and puts his last money down for it. His age and the scholary lessons from prison make him appear like an experienced veteran, the uniform does a perpetuing job in the streets where no one would ever dare to question it's bearer. Even soldiers of lower rank submit to the uniform and the harsh commanding voice of the shoemaker who's sharpest weapon was that he simply had nothing more to loose. The uniformed Voigt hijacks a coincidentally patrolling imperial platoon and orders them to the city-hall of Köpenick (a suburb of the capitol Berlin). Under his command they set the building under siege while Voigt intends to get a couple of minutes alone at the registration-office to issue himself a real passport. That's when the true High-Command gets aware of the incident.
Heinz Rühmann who in his prime may have been for the Germans what Tom Hanks is for Americans these days- shows the essence of his acting-nature here: a humorous, always kind-hearted, simple man with a tragic halo who is nevertheless willing to find his place in life and to do anything for that, except harming other people. Der Hauptmann von Köpenick" is a brilliant and disarming masterpiece about the naive military-mania and the ridiculousness of blind obedience to uniforms and is generally even valuable about it these days. It also accuses the monstrous prussian bureaucracy which is also criticiseable even today and which still refuses to see the human beings behind all the documents.
Ever since the original incident from 1906, in German gossip the term Köpenickade"* is used to describe masquerades mainly to cheat authorities and/or to accomplish something which is actually your right but which you can't accomplish the straight way. But it is only used in these contexts when nobody came to harm.
From this fact-based theater-play by novelist Carl Zuckmayer there've been numerous screen- or TV-adaptions. You actually only need this one.
* Pronounced: Ko-Panic-Uh-De" -
tgiov15 July 2005If stage is included, this play has been the first real caper movie with a smart and sympathetic robber and and a weak but unbeatable seeming system, which is able to give him no options in his normal life, than to beat the system with it's own weapons. The real case of Wilhelm Voigt is as legend in and around Berlin. Zuckmayer's play is one of the best of it's time. I've seen it on stage several times in several towns and countries, but Rühmann is not to defeat. No one else did the job that good, than he did, seeming to be a tall guy, when he was just a small one, being impressing, when he didn't even knew how to handle his own life, giving the money back to prove the faults of the system or just to get a passport. If you like caper movies, just check out, what brains of them might have seen before...
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This true historic story tells a lot of the Kaiser's era as imperator of germany up to 1918. Rühmann prooves being an excellent comedy-actor. By charm spectators are seduced into the first decade of the 20th century, where life had there no witticism, and keep on Rühmann's side in the movie.
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Forget Heinz Ruehmann playing Heinz Ruehmann interpreting the "Hauptmann von Koepenick", concentrate on some of the remarkable supporting actors and actresses to have at least some fun. And then, try to get 1931's "Hauptmann von Koepenick" with Max Adalbert...