''Duped Till Doomsday'' () is a 1957 East German

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular ...

directed by

Kurt Jung-Alsen Kurt Jung-Alsen (18 June 1915 – 20 December 1976) was a German film director and screenwriter. He directed 24 films between 1954 and 1976. Selected filmography * ''The Call of the Sea'' (1951) * '' Duped Till Doomsday'' (1957) * ''Polonia ...

. It was entered into the

1957 Cannes Film Festival The 10th Cannes Film Festival took place from 2 to 17 May 1957. French writer André Maurois served as jury president for the main competition, while Dolores del Río was the first female member of the jury for the official selection. The ''P ...

Plot

Soldiers Wagner, Paulun and Lick are three friends and the best sharpshooters in a division stationed in

Latvia Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east and Belarus to t ...

, near the German-Soviet border. During June 1941, while on leave, they take a walk near a river and spot movement in a bush. Believing it to be a bird, they shoot in its direction, only to discover that they have killed Angelika, their captain's daughter. The three dump her corpse in a swamp and proceed as if nothing happened. Lick relates the incident to his father, a Waffen-SS general, who decides to use the corpse for propaganda purposes: on 22 June, the day of the invasion of the Soviet Union, he exhumes Angelika's remains and claims she was killed by Soviet marauders. Her father orders to shoot a number of Latvian women in retaliation. Paulun tries to tell the truth, but Lick claims he is insane; Wagner remains silent. When Paulun tries to escape arrest, he is killed by Lick. Wagner does nothing and continues to behave as usual.

Cast

Rudolf Ulrich Rudolf Ulrich (3 January 1922 – 4 April 1997) was a German film actor. He appeared in 67 films between 1954 and 1986. He died in Berlin at age 75. Filmography References External links

* 1922 births 1997 deaths German male fil ...

as Wagner *

Wolfgang Kieling Wolfgang Kieling (16 March 1924 – 7 October 1985) was a German actor. Biography In films since childhood in his native Germany, Kieling appeared in a few American films, notably in Alfred Hitchcock's '' Torn Curtain'' (1966), where he playe ...

as Lick * Hans-Joachim Martens as Paulun *

Walther Süssenguth Walther Süssenguth (February 8, 1900 - April 28, 1964) was a German actor. Filmography External links * 1900 births 1964 deaths People from Schleiz People from the Principality of Reuss-Gera German male film actors 20th-century Germ ...

as captain *

Renate Küster Renate is a feminine given name. It is derived from the Latin name Renatus. It is common in German, Dutch and Norwegian. Notable people with the given name include: *Renate Aschauer-Knaup (born 1948), German singer (Amon Düül II) *Renate Blauel ...

as Angelika * Peter Kiwitt as Waffen-SS General Lick * Hermann Dieckhoff as division commander *

Kurt Ulrich Kurt Ulrich (28 June 1905 – 11 September 1967) was a German film producer. He produced more than 140 films between 1933 and 1964. He was born in Berlin, Germany. Selected filmography * ''Everything for a Woman'' (1935) * '' Every Day Is ...

as lieutenant *

Erich Brauer Erich Brauer (28 June 1895, in Berlin – 9 May 1942, in Petah Tikvah) was a German Jewish illustrator, ethnographer, and ethnologist. As an artist he chose to be known as Erich Chiram Brauer. He often signed his art work "Chiram". Early lif ...

as staff sergeant * Hannes Fischer as kitchen sergeant * Wolfgang Lippert as Voss *

Helga Raumer Helga (derived from Old Norse ''heilagr'' - "holy", "blessed") is a female name, used mainly in Scandinavia, German-speaking countries and the Low Countries (''Hege'', ''Helle'', ''Helge'', ''Helga'', ''Helka'' or ''Oili''). The name was in use i ...

as innkeeper's daughter *

Fritz Diez Fritz Diez (27 February 1901 – 19 October 1979) was a German actor, producer, director and theater manager. Biography Early life Diez's mother was a servant, and raised her three children alone. To support his family, the child began working ...

Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his suicide in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the lea ...

(voice) * Horst Giese as uncredited role

Production

The script was adapted from the 1955-published novel ''Kameraden'' by

Franz Fühmann Franz Fühmann (15 January 1922 – 8 July 1984) was a German writer who lived and worked in East Germany. He wrote in a variety of formats, including short stories, essays, screenplays and children's books. Influenced by Nazism in his yout ...

. Fühmann himself was excluded from participating in the production.Dennis Tate. ''Franz Fühmann, innovation and authenticity: a study of his prose-writing''. . page 50. The picture was the first of the "army epics", a new East German genre that reformed the classic German style of portraying military comradeship, replacing the typical tales of military friendship with plots centered on moral dilemmas facing the servicemen.Miera Liehm, Antonin J. Liehm . ''The Most Important Art: Soviet and Eastern European Film After 1945''. . Page 269. In addition, the picture was intended as a response to the war films produced in the West at those years.Detlef Kannapin. ''Dialektik der Bilder''. . Page 150.

Reception

''Betrogen bis zum jüngsten Tag'' was the first East German film to be entered into the Cannes Film Festival; a year earlier, at 1956, ''

Zar und Zimmermann ''Zar und Zimmermann'' (''Tsar and Carpenter'') is a comic opera in three acts, music by Albert Lortzing, libretto by the composer after Georg Christian Römer's ''Der Bürgermeister von Saardam, oder Die zwei Peter'', itself based on the French p ...

'' and ''

Der Teufelskreis ''Der Teufelskreis'' is an East German East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from its formation on 7 October 1949 until its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on 3 Octo ...

'' were screened outside the competition. Although the picture had no chance of winning due to political considerations, it was nominated for the

Palme d'Or The (; ) is the highest prize awarded to the director of the Best Feature Film of the Official Competition at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the festival's organizing committee. Previously, from 1939 to 1954, the festiv ...

. The film was DEFA's most successful project since the 1946 ''

Murderers Among Us ''Die Mörder sind unter uns'', a German film known in English as ''Murderers Among Us'' in the United States or ''The Murderers Are Among Us'' in the United Kingdom was one of the first post-World War II German films and the first '' Trümmerfi ...

''. It was well received abroad. The '' Punch'' magazine's reviewer wrote that it was "very worth seeing... mostly admirable, flowed in the end."''Punch'', Volume 234. Page 163.
/ref> The East German media called it "the first DEFA war film" and praised it. Fühmann's work received considerable attention due to the film, and his books were re-printed.

References

External links

*{{IMDb title, id=0050187, title=Duped Till Doomsday *
Betrogen bis zum jüngsten Tag
' on PROGRESS' website. 1957 films 1957 drama films German drama films East German films 1950s German-language films German black-and-white films Films directed by Kurt Jung-Alsen Films about Nazi Germany 1950s German films