#fritz schulz

Maybe in another universe they live happily together...Do they?

"Different from the others" is still as relevant as never even after after 106 years

Anyway,happy pride month everyone!🌈

Sua vain yli kaiken mä rakastan 😭

Music: Vaasan kaupunginorkesteri 2nd violin trio "Romanssi" (2020)

Different from the Others (ger. Anders als die Andern) was a 1919 german silent film directed by Richard Oswald. The story follows two musicians (played by Conrad Veidt and Fritz Schulz) who fall in love and become the victim of a blackmailer (Reinhold Schünzel). Dancer Anita Berber and sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld (who also co-wrote the film) appear in supporting roles. It is generally regarded as the first pro-gay rights film ever created, with it’s protagonist being the first sympathetic depiction of a gay character in film. It had been created as protest to Paragraph 175, a german law which outlawed sex acts between two men. It was the same law that led to the imprisonment and execution of queer people in Nazi concentration camps, and which would be used to justify the continued imprisonment of these people even after the Nazis were defeated. The law was not repealed until 1994. 

While the film was surprisingly well received by the public at it’s release, it became the target of a number of campaigns organized by right-wing christian and anti-Semitic groups (many involved with the film’s production were Jewish including Oswald, Schulz, Schünzel, and Hirschfeld. Fritz Schulz was the target of much anti-semitic vitriol by certain reviewers). These campaigns eventually led to the film being pulled from theatres, and the Weimar laws which allowed free-speech being changed to prevent screenings of the film (except to doctors and researchers). Most of these screenings were staged by Hirschfeld’s Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, which had also helped finance the production. When the Nazis eventually came to power, all copies of the film were ordered destroyed, though portions of it have survived, and were eventually restored for modern audiences. 

The images above:

1. The poster for Different from the Others

2. The title card, which includes a reference to Paragraph 175.

3. A still from a scene in the film which shows the blackmailer (Reinhold Schünzel) meeting a man in a drag club. A number of gay and lesbian couples can be seen dancing in the background.

4. A still from a scene where Conrad Veidt’s character seeks help for his sexuality from a sexologist played by Magnus Hirschfeld himself.