Messter Film was a German

film production Filmmaking or film production is the process by which a Film, motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, beginning with an initial story, idea, or commission. Production then continues through screen ...

company which operated during the

silent era A silent film is a film without synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, wh ...

. It was founded by the German film pioneer

Oskar Messter Oskar Messter (21 November 1866 – 6 December 1943) was a German Reich, German inventor and film tycoon in the early years of film, cinema. His firm Messter Film was one of the dominant German producers before the rise of Universum Film AG, ...

who already owned a chain of cinemas. It was based in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

which had emerged as the centre of the German film industry. Messter quickly established itself as dominant force in German production, particularly during the boom years of the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

when foreign films faced many restrictions in Germany. Messter played a prominent role in the development of the German

feature film A feature film or feature-length film (often abbreviated to feature), also called a theatrical film, is a film (Film, motion picture, "movie" or simply “picture”) with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole present ...

, moving away from the shorter running times which had been standard in the early years of cinema. Messter also produced its own

newsreels A newsreel is a form of short documentary film, containing news stories and items of topical interest, that was prevalent between the 1910s and the mid 1970s. Typically presented in a cinema, newsreels were a source of current affairs, info ...

. In 1909 Messter Film took part in the

Paris Film Congress The Paris Film Congress was a major meeting of European film producers and distributors in the French capital Paris from 2–4 February 1909. It intended to create an association to protect the interests of the participants through the formation ...

, a failed attempt by Europe's leading producers to create a film

cartel A cartel is a group of independent market participants who collaborate with each other as well as agreeing not to compete with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the market. A cartel is an organization formed by producers ...

similar to that formed by the MPPC in the United States.Thorsen p.71 In 1917 the company became part of the large conglomerate

Universum Film AG UFA GmbH, shortened to UFA (), is a film and television production company that unites all production activities of the media conglomerate Bertelsmann in Germany. The original UFA was established as on December 18, 1917, as a direct response t ...

(UFA) which brought together many of the leading German companies in a single, powerful organisation. For several years after this Messter continued to produce films as an individual unit of the UFA umbrella. UFA took over Messter's associated

distribution Distribution may refer to: Mathematics *Distribution (mathematics), generalized functions used to formulate solutions of partial differential equations *Probability distribution, the probability of a particular value or value range of a varia ...

partner Hansa Film.

References

Bibliography

* Bergfelder, Tim & Bock, Hans-Michael. ''The Concise Cinegraph: Encyclopedia of German''. Berghahn Books, 2009. * Hardt, Ursula. ''From Caligari to California: Erich Pommer's Life in the International Film Wars''. Berghahn Books, 1996. * Thorsen, Isak. ''Nordisk Films Kompagni 1906-1924, Volume 5: The Rise and Fall of the Polar Bear''. Indiana University Press, 2017. * Prawer, S.S. ''Between Two Worlds: The Jewish Presence in German and Austrian Film, 1910-1933''. Berghahn Books, 2005. German film studios Film production companies of Germany Mass media companies disestablished in 1917 Mass media in Berlin Mass media companies established in 1897 1917 disestablishments in Germany 1917 mergers and acquisitions German companies established in 1897 Film production companies established in the 1890s {{film-company-stub