Douglas sirk

Born on April 26, 1900, in the German city of Hamburg, Claus Detlef Sierck was the son of a Danish couple. From a very young age he became fond of the theater and the films of the Danish actress Asta Nielsen, almost always dramas similar to those that would make him famous many years later.

After World War I, the young Sierck enrolled in law at the University of Munich, then went on to study philosophy and art history in his hometown. When he finished his degree, he started working writing articles for newspapers, following in the footsteps of his mother, who was a journalist. Shortly after, he managed to get his head into the theater world, first as an assistant to renowned directors, and finally as an artistic director.

In the mid-1930s, UFA studios were in need of directors with theater experience to compete with Hollywood. He started in 1934, with the comic short Zwei Genies , and his first feature was Das Mädchen vom Moorfhof . Sirk himself said that his first melodrama –a word that etymologically unites the words ‘music’ and ‘drama’– would be the film about music, with exaggerated tear-jerking elements, The Ninth Symphony . A renowned orchestra conductor adopts a child who was abandoned. He hires a governess to look after him, who turns out to be the boy’s mother. These turns, without a doubt, were a declaration of intent of what the filmmaker’s cinema was going to be. From his German stage stand out The captive swallow andLa habanera , shot in the Canary Islands, although the action took place in Puerto Rico. Even the Nazi Minister of Propaganda, Josef Goebbels, declared himself an admirer of the filmmaker and his films, until then signed with his real name: Detlef Sierck.

Divorced from Lydia Brinken, with whom he had his only child, Detlef Sierck got married to the stage actress Hilde Jary. She had to escape to Rome, due to her Jewish origin, while the director’s ex-wife – a fervent follower of Hitler – denounced him for having a relationship with a Jew. He decided to run away, meeting Hilde Jary in Rome, and they both later moved to the United States. Unfortunately, the filmmaker never saw his son again, who died during the war.

In his first Hollywood film, Hitler’s Madman , he signed for the first time as Douglas Sirk – his Americanized name. In this war drama, a group of Czech citizens resist the Nazi invaders and plan to assassinate Commander Heydrich.

After Strange Confession , an adaptation of a story by Chekhov, he directs A Scandal in Paris , a biopic of the famous French historical figure Eugene Vidocq, masterfully interpreted by George Sanders . He also starred in El asesino poeta , the filmmaker’s next film.

In the early 1950s, Sirk agreed to work under contract for Universal, where he had complete creative freedom, to the point that he managed to establish his own style and direct his best-known films. He develops historical films ( Attila, King of the Huns , Pride of Race ), musicals ( Meet Me at the Fair ), comedies (Has Anyone Seen My Girl?) and westerns ( Take Me to Town , Race of Violence ) . .

But Sirk stood out above all in the field of melodrama. Barbara Stanwyck was a woman seeking forgiveness from her children, in His great desire for her. The actress repeated her orders in There is always a tomorrow . Rock Hudson and Jane Wyman –his ideal leading couple– lead the cast of the unbeatable Obsession , about a millionaire in love with the widow of the doctor who saved his life. The film was based on a novel by Lloyd C. Douglas that had already led to Sublime Obsession , an absolute masterpiece by John M. Stahl .

Shortly after, Sirk did not hesitate to recruit the same protagonists for Heaven Only Knows , one of his best films, and one of the most remembered, where Wyman was a wealthy widow who falls in love with a younger gardener (Hudson). and humble than her, unleashing gossip around her and the opposition of her children.

Hudson also starred in another of Sirk’s signature titles, Written on the Wind , in which the heir to an oil empire ( Robert Stack ) marries a woman ( Lauren Bacall ) who also attracts his friend and confidant Mitch Wayne ( Hudson).

Sirk had done well covering the great Stahl, so in 1956 he shot Love Interlude , a remake of his film Hurricane , which in turn was based on a story by James M. Cain .

It wouldn’t be the last time Sirk updates Stahl. After Dull Angels , with spectacular aerial sequences, and the war drama A Time to Love, a Time to Die , Sirk closed his filmography with Imitation of Life , a remake of Stahl ‘s Imitation of Life . Despite his excellent reception, he left the United States due to health problems, and also because he did not feel comfortable in the years of the Witch Hunt. Since he did not want to return to Germany either, since he considered that many of those who were in power during Nazism were still in power, he settled in Switzerland. Since then he has dedicated his life to the theater, occasionally returning to the big screen with a short film. He died on January 14, 1987 at his Swiss residence.