The Wandsbek Studios are film production and

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

studios A studio is an artist or worker's workroom. This can be for the purpose of acting, architecture, painting, pottery ( ceramics), sculpture, origami, woodworking, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, industrial design ...

located in

Wandsbek Wandsbek () is the second-largest of seven boroughs that make up the city and state of Hamburg, Germany. The name of the district is derived from the river Wandse which passes through here. Wandsbek, which was formerly an independent city, is ur ...

, a district of the German city of

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

. The complex was established in 1948 when

Real Film Real Film or Real-Film was a West German film production company. It was established in 1947 in Hamburg, then part of the British Zone of Occupation. Its founders were Walter Koppel and the Hungarian Gyula Trebitsch. The company released some rub ...

, set up the previous year, acquired a site in Wandsbek for construction of a studio. Real Film was one of the first German companies to receive a production licence in the wake of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

. The studios were located in the

British Zone of Occupation Germany was already de facto occupied by the Allies from the real fall of Nazi Germany in World War II on 8 May 1945 to the establishment of the East Germany on 7 October 1949. The Allies (United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and France ...

which in 1949 became part of

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

. Historically the film industry had been centered in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

, but as much of this was now under Communist

East German East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...

control, West German production shifted to Hamburg and the

Bavaria Studios Bavaria Studios are film production studios located in Munich, the capital of the region of Bavaria in Germany, and a subsidiary of Bavaria Film. History The studios were constructed in the suburb of Geiselgasteig in 1919 shortly after the Fir ...

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

. While Wandsbek was primarily the base of Real Film, it also rented out space to other companies for their productions, such as the 1952 hit '' Toxi'' (1952). Real Film was a leading film producer of popular cinema during the 1950s producing films such as '' The Captain from Köpenick'' (1956). However, the company struggled during the 1960s and was overtaken by outfits such as

Constantin Film The Constantin Film AG is a German mini-major film production and distribution company based in Munich. The company, which belongs to Swiss media conglomerate Highlight Communications AG, is a large independent German maker and distributor of pr ...

. In 1961, it was renamed Studio Hamburg and branched increasingly into

television production A television show – or simply TV show – is any content produced for viewing on a television set which can be broadcast via over-the-air, satellite, or cable, excluding breaking news, advertisements, or trailers that are typically placed be ...

. It was involved in the Pinewood Studio Berlin partnership. A wholly owned subsidiary is Letterbox Filmproduktion GmbH, under whose name television series such as Notruf Hafenkante, Großstadtrevier, Die Pfefferkörner and Die Kanzlei are produced.

References

Bibliography

* Davidson, John & Hake, Sabine. ''Framing the Fifties: Cinema in a Divided Germany''. Berghahn Books, 2007. * Fenner, Angelica. ''Race Under Reconstruction in German Cinema: Robert Stemmle's Toxi''. University of Toronto Press, 2011. German film studios Television studios Hamburg Buildings and structures in Wandsbek {{film-studio-stub