My life for Ireland

My life for Ireland (German: Mein Leben für Irland) is a German anti-British propaganda movie from 1941 directed by Max W. Kimmich.

Plot

In 1903, the Irish nationalist Michael O'Brien is captured in Dublin after committing an attack on British policemen, and he is sentenced to death. While he is in jail, his pregnant fiancée Maeve visits him and they are secretly married. Afterwards, Michael hands his wife a silver cross that would always be worn by the best Irish freedom fighter. On the cross, the words My life for Ireland are engraved.

Eighteen years later, in 1921, his son Michael Jr. is expecting to pass his school leaving exams. As the son of an infamous Irish nationalist, he has been educated in a college run by British teachers. This way the British government wanted to re-educate Irish pupils into "worthful" British civilians.

Propaganda

This film contributed to the era of anti-British film.^[1] In this film, as in Der Fuchs von Glenarvon, the British are depicted as brutal and unscrupulous oppressors but no match for the Irish.^[2] A British officer, for instance, simply abandons an Irish sergeant on the battlefield, taking the last water bottle with him, and winning the Victoria Cross.^[3] It lacks, however, the cruder propaganda of later years, such as Carl Peters and Ohm Krüger, when Hitler had given up hope of making peace with Great Britain.^[4] The anti-British atmosphere of the film, however, can be judged from the opening sequence, which depicts a meeting of Irish revolutionaries:^[5]

ASSEMBLY: We must build new roads
LEADER: With what shall we build new roads?
ASSEMBLY: With the bones of our enemy!
LEADER: And who is our enemy?
ASSEMBLY: England!

Some German viewers in ethnically mixed areas expressed fears that it would stimulate Poles to rebellion.^[6] The film, however, enjoyed a positive response from the audiences.^[7]

References

1. ^ Cinzia Romani, Tainted Goddesses: Female Film Stars of the Third Reich p69 ISBN 0-9627613-1-1
2. ^ Erwin Leiser, Nazi Cinema p97 ISBN 0-02-570230-0
3. ^ Erwin Leiser, Nazi Cinema p97-8 ISBN 0-02-570230-0
4. ^ Erwin Leiser, Nazi Cinema p98 ISBN 0-02-570230-0
5. ^ Welch, David (2001). Propaganda and the German cinema, 1933-1945. Tauris, p. 228. ISBN 1860645208
6. ^ Richard Grunberger, The 12-Year Reich, p 385, ISBN 03-076435-1
7. ^ Fox, Jo (2007). Film propaganda in Britain and Nazi Germany: World War II cinema. Berg Publishers, p. 171. ISBN 1859738966

External links

• Mein Leben für Irland at the Internet Movie Database