Messter Film was a German

film production Filmmaking (film production) is the process by which a motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, starting with an initial story, idea, or commission. It then continues through screenwriting, casti ...

company which operated during the

silent era A silent film is a film with no 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 inventor and film tycoon in the early years of cinema. His firm Messter Film was one of the dominant German producers before the rise of UFA, into which it was ultimately merg ...

who already owned a chain of cinemas.Hardt p.12 It was based in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

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 (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

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 is a narrative film (motion picture or "movie") with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole presentation in a commercial entertainment program. The term ''feature film'' originall ...

, 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, informa ...

. 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 of ...

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

cartel A cartel is a group of independent market participants who collude with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the market. Cartels are usually associations in the same sphere of business, and thus an alliance of rivals. Mos ...

similar to that formed by the MPPC in the United States. 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. Its name derives from Universum-Film Aktiengesellschaft (normally abbreviated as ...

(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 vari ...

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. * 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