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Figure 20: Spotlights and strong backlights to create a silhouette effect dominate in The Robber Symphony for the first time in Schüfftan's career.

After filming The Robber Symphony, Schüfftan returned briefly to Paris in the autumn of 1935 to work as cinematographer on La Tendre ennemie/The Tender Enemy, his second project with Max Ophüls, following their collaboration on Dann schon lieber Lebertran in 1931. The film is a social comedy set on the day of Line Dupont's engagement party, thrown for her by her mother Annette. Amongst the attendees are three uninvited guests, ghosts of Annette's former lovers, including her husband, the father of Line. The ghosts watch over the events of the day whilst reminiscing with each other about their time spent with Annette.

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Before discussing Schüfftan's lighting technique in La Tendre ennemie it is worth noting that, beyond just lighting, Schüfftan was also responsible for the effects of the three ghosts who appear throughout the film. For as Schüfftan explained much later in his career, in a letter to his agency dated 13th November 1956, the cinematographer working in Europe was also charged with creating special effects, 'as the separation of special effects and camera work is not known in Europe in contrast to Hollywood. In Europe special effect departments don't exist.'13

The ghosts are not presented in the film as opaque corporeal bodies, but rather as semitransparent ethereal beings. There are two possible methods Schüfftan could have employed to create the transparent effect used for the ghosts. The first is through the double exposure of the film stock, rewinding the film used and re-exposing it with a new image. The second, and a strong possibility considering Schüfftan's heritage with the 'Schüfftan Process' and its similarities, is to place a piece of clear glass at a 45 degree angle in front of the camera. If the 'ghosts' are positioned in the correct position off-camera a reflection of their image will be reflected in the glass, appearing in the lens as superimposed over the set positioned directly in front of the camera.

13 Eugen Schüfftan file of the Paul Kohner archive, Deutsche Kinemathek.

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Figure 21: Schüfftan employs trick photography for ghostly effects in La Tendre ennemie.

Schüfftan further enhances the spectral qualities of the ghosts through his approach to lighting (see Figure 21). Regardless of which technique was employed by Schüfftan, double exposure or glass reflection, both allow the cinematographer to light the ghost separately to the set, as they are two separate elements before they are combined in the same image. As such Schüfftan has lit the ghosts more strongly in the second element of the image, the result being that they stand apart from the location they are in, seeming not to belong. This is particularly enhanced by the strong use of backlight which gives a glowing effect around the profiles of the ghosts. Such an effect is evident throughout the film, disconnecting the ghosts from the realm of the living, placing them within what we could term a Deleuzean 'any- space-whatever' of their own.

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With such a technique in mind it is interesting to consider how Schüfftan chooses to light the characters who occupy the world of the living. The approach adopted by Schüfftan is in fact contrary to the style he has developed thus far in his career. He chooses not to employ a strong backlight to separate the subjects of the frame from the background set, which would create depth within the image. Rather, when filming the living characters Schüfftan avoids using backlights, favouring key and fill lights. The effect of this is that there is no strong definition between the characters and their background, somewhat flattening the image (see Figure 22). However, this serves a specific purpose in La Tendre ennemie, functioning to root the living into the space in which they live, literally making them 'part of the wallpaper', whereas the ghosts remain detached, backlit, residing in their any-space-whatever.

Figure 22: In La Tendre ennemie Schüfftan roots the living characters into the world through avoidance of backlighting.

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Schüfftan's lighting and camera techniques, employed to create the impression of a flashback as the ghosts first remember their time with Annette, merit our attention. When this flashback first begins an effect of mottled spinning lights, travelling from left to right, passes behind the subject. A dissolve then signals the beginning of the flashback sequence and this spinning light effect continues throughout. This moving light effect is not clear to illustrate in a static image, however, the spotlights can be seen, cast against the background of the set, in Figure 23, below. In a film comprised of separate worlds – of the living and the dead – this lighting effect functions to differentiate the flashback sequences. Therefore, just as Schüfftan lighting technique differentiates the living from the dead, his lighting also differentiates between the present and memories of the past.

Figure 23: Schüfftan's spinning background lights signals the scene as a flashback.

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Scenes worth noting for Schüfftan's lighting effects and camera techniques include the death of Annette’s husband, as well as the death of the third ghost, both of which are presented in flashback. In the death scene of the husband we see him dancing with his wife at a club, with the camera following their twists and turns around the dance floor, as you might expect of an Ophüls film. When the husband suddenly stops dancing and clutches his heart the camera also abruptly stops with him. It then suddenly performs a full 360 degree pan around its axis, before resting once again on Annette and her husband as he collapses to the floor and dies. The panning movement is performed at such a quick pace that nothing is visible except a blur until it has completed its motion. This functions to replicate in the spectator the sensation of giddiness and disorientation experienced by Annette's husband in the moment of his death, achieved through the apparatus of the camera itself. Schüfftan's techniques are equally as crucial to the death scene of the third ghost. Having received a letter from Annette he walks off along the quay, away from the camera. The water is in darkness, and only two beams of light (spotlights) shine across the pavement. When he has passed this second beam of light he is subsumed in darkness. The image begins to fade as a gunshot is heard over the soundtrack, signaling his suicide.

Novel use of lighting occurs during the flashback of the second ghost, Rodrigo the lion tamer, where the camera itself is drawn attention to. In the scene Annette and the lion-tamer ride together in the back of the carriage with the light appearing to originate from a position behind the camera. There is also a visible light source from the window on the opposite side of the carriage. We see Annette lean over and pull the blind down covering this window, slightly dimming the level of base light in the carriage. She then reaches towards the camera. When her hand has reached the top of the frame this action prompts a cut, suggesting that she has pulled down the blind positioned in the location of the camera, thus blocking the light source and causing darkness.

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One indirect reason La Tendre ennemie is of particular importance, not only to Schüfftan's own career, but to the history of French cinema, is that this was the first occasion on which Henri Alékan acted as Schüfftan's camera assistant. Alékan worked under Schüfftan's tutelage on numerous occasions during the 1930s after this initial collaboration, before Alékan became a cinematographer in his own right in the 1940s. He would go onto film, amongst many others, La Belle et la Bête/Beauty and the Beast (Jean Cocteau, 1945), Anna Karenina (Julien Duvivier, 1947), Roman Holiday (William Wyler, 1952) and Wings of Desire (Wim Wenders, 1986). Alékan has repeatedly asserted the influence of Schüfftan on his long career as a cinematographer:

Schüfftan initiated me into the secrets of his Art, which consisted of two principles: observation of composition and light in the Old Masters; transposition and application to the cinema of the rules this reveals. […] For me, this experience was devastating, a revelation. The relationship between Schüfftan and his directors – Pabst, Carné – was astonishingly rich. At last I had an opportunity to escape from a milieu in which light was considered as a simple physical given, and to get to know a cameraman who had over many years mediated on the aesthetic and psychological problems of light. (Crisp, 1997: 377)

This quote, from Schüfftan’s most faithful apprentice, reveals the true source of Schüfftan’s photographic inspiration. Rather than the German Expressionist movement and the bold chiaroscuro effects to which Schüfftan is so frequently attached, his approach was actually informed by his formative artistic training. Amongst the Old Masters that Schüfftan studied, the figure that stands out as the most profound influence upon the cinematographer is Rembrandt (Elsaesser, 2000: 433).14 Schüfftan took from Rembrandt an interest in the tonality of light, and a subtle use of chiaroscuro effects, which is perhaps why he has become

14Alékan also cites Gustave Doré, Léonardo da Vinci and Giovanni Piranèse as artistic models, perhaps due to his training under Schüffan’s tutelage (Crisp, 1997: 379).

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so conflated with Expressionism. However, there is a notable style to Rembrandt’s, and thereafter Schüfftan’s use of chiaroscuro. This is particularly noticeable in Rembrandt’s portraits, and therefore Schüfftan’s close-ups and medium close-ups. The effect is created by casting a strong source light against once side of the subject’s face, with a softer light cast upon the other side. In addition to creating a structured lighting of the subject, this results in an interesting interaction between shadow and light upon the dimmer side of the face, and

Rembrandt’s trademark patch of light beneath the subject’s eye. In cinematic terms, this has become known as ‘Rembrandt lighting’ (now a common template for portrait photography), and is created by fixing a strong key light at a high angle on one side of the subject, and a softer fill light, at half the height, on the other side (Ferncase, 1995: 132). Schüfftan’s use of this technique dates back as early as Menschen am Sonntag, his first film as cinematographer. Whilst Rembrandt lighting is used infrequently by Schüfftan on Menschen am Sonntag, as location shooting was favoured, resulting in less control of lighting, it can be seen in certain interior scenes (as in Figure 24, where the high angle of the key lighting casts shadows to the right).

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Figure 24: Rembrandt lighting on Menschen am Sonntag.

Finally, in this mis-aligning of Schüfftan with Expressionism, Rembrandt lighting was a term first coined prior to this movement of German cinema. The term first arose in relation to film lighting in 1915, in California, by Cecil B. DeMille. DeMille was filming The Warren of Virginia and had borrowed theatre lights, with which he was able to create a particular effect. When the studio was unhappy with the results, DeMille dubbed the technique ‘Rembrandt lighting’, delighting the studio with the marketing possibilities this offered (Eyman, 2010: 93). This technique also became known as ‘Lasky lighting’, after the studio head, ‘and set the standard for motion picture photography between 1915 and 1918.’ (Birchard, 2004: 40) The tutelage of such techniques by Schüfftan and other German cinematographers to the cameramen of France would come to profoundly affect the French cinema of the 1930s and

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40s. But first Schüfftan was to reunite with Max Ophüls outside of France, in the Netherlands, after a brief return to Britain.

The Netherlands (via Britain)

Following La Tendre ennemie Schüfftan returned to Great Britain where he filmed Children of the Fog (1935) under the direction of Leopold Jessner and John Quin. Jessner was a German theatre director and disciple of Reinhardt, and was an early proponent of Expressionist film alongside Paul Leni in the direction of Hintertreppe/Backstairs (1921). Like many others, Jessner was forced into exile when Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, and attempted to forge a career for himself in British theatre, attempting two unsuccessful stage productions in London (Ritchie, 1996: 158). Turning to the cinema, Jessner established his own production company, Jesba Films, which produced Children of the Fog, set around the inhabitants of a bleak tenement on the London docklands. Much like Jessner's stage productions, the film was not well received in Britain and has been quickly forgotten by film history. In this history of Schüfftan however, Jessner’s Expressionist background stands as a further example of how Schüfftan came to adopt certain traits of the Expressionist style, despite the fact that the dominance of Expressionism in Germany had long abated.

Children of the Fog was Schüfftan's last film in Britain, where he had achieved little commercial or critical success but had experienced a profound impact upon his filmmaking style. Schüfftan's return to France was via Amsterdam where he was reunited with Max Ophüls. Ophüls had been working in postproduction on La Tendre ennemie, when an opportunity had presented itself from the Tuschinski family in the Netherlands, to make a film intended to be the pinnacle of the celebrations for the fifteenth anniversary of the

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