Cinemas Exiles From Hitler to Hollywood (2009)

Eight hundred German filmmakers cast and crew fled the Nazis in the 1930s The film uses voiceovers archival footage and film clips to examine Berlins vital filmmaking in the 1920s then it follows a producer directors composers editors writers and actors to Hollywood some succeeded and many found no work Among those profiled are Erich Pommer Joseph May Ernst Lubitsch Fritz Lang Billy Wilder and Peter Lorre Once in Hollywood these exiles helped each other housed new arrivals and raised money so others could escape Some worked on antiNazi films like Casablanca The themes and lighting of German Expressionism gave rise in Hollywood to film noir