Douglas Sirk und das ironisierte Melodram

In 1937, the German director Douglas Sirk fled to the USA. The melodramas he directed in Hollywood during the 1950s had a lasting impact on the genre. Douglas Sirk was originally a theater man and was responsible for many important productions in German theater during the 1920s. The Nazis campaigned against his work, forcing him to turn to film in the 1930s. At UFA, he discovered Zarah Leander. His plans for emigration were long thwarted due to his passport being revoked for unreliability. In 1937, he flew to the USA via Italy. There, he faced significant challenges in entering the film industry. At Universal, he became an immensely successful melodrama director in the 1950s. His specialty was ironic breaks in melodrama, a stylistic device that is central to this book. "Written on the Wind" from 1956 and "Imitation of Life" from 1959, his last directorial work in Hollywood, are his most famous films. Sirk did not only make melodramas, but melodramatic moments are prominent in all his films. For a long time, he was considered a director of the worst kind of melodramas. It wasn't until the 1960s that Sirk began to be rediscovered. Significant film scholars and critics wrote enthusiastic analyses of his work.