Germany 1910, after a true story ... In deepest prussian Germany at the beginning of the 20th century the shoemaker Wilhelm Voigt (Heinz Rühmann) is released from prison where he spent most of his lifetime. By nature never truly a bad guy but someone who kept over water by smalltime swindling he mostly got unlucky and repeatedly went to jail. Generally of good will he spent his time there working and learning everything he could. In a military influenced society and era like this the scholary-lessons were dominated by army knowledge which one would actually call meaningless for civil life. Particularly today everybody would fear any such knowledge in the hands of civilians as a basis for terrorist-actions.
Now on the edge to retirement Voigt gets his pardon and goes free, the law knows he's too old to commit serious crimes. Equipped only with the releasing paper of the Ministry Of Justice he tries to get back into life, eager to finish it as a decent working man. But the paper though stamped and typed by the legal authorities- ain't accepted nowhere as a passport and isn't even meant to be swapped into one, not even at any communal registration office. And without passport: no job! Without registered employment: no passport! A vicious circle... Weeks of unregistered residence later the order to leave the country hits Voigt like a nail to the temple. Desperate about the authorities oppression he roams the streets and comes to a pawn-shop. He spots an abandoned captain's uniform (which in this film has had an own interesting story) in the window and puts his last money down for it. His age and the scholary lessons from prison make him appear like an experienced veteran, the uniform does a perpetuing job in the streets where no one would ever dare to question it's bearer. Even soldiers of lower rank submit to the uniform and the harsh commanding voice of the shoemaker who's sharpest weapon was that he simply had nothing more to loose. The uniformed Voigt hijacks a coincidentally patrolling imperial platoon and orders them to the city-hall of Köpenick (a suburb of the capitol Berlin). Under his command they set the building under siege while Voigt intends to get a couple of minutes alone at the registration-office to issue himself a real passport. That's when the true High-Command gets aware of the incident.
Heinz Rühmann who in his prime may have been for the Germans what Tom Hanks is for Americans these days- shows the essence of his acting-nature here: a humorous, always kind-hearted, simple man with a tragic halo who is nevertheless willing to find his place in life and to do anything for that, except harming other people. Der Hauptmann von Köpenick" is a brilliant and disarming masterpiece about the naive military-mania and the ridiculousness of blind obedience to uniforms and is generally even valuable about it these days. It also accuses the monstrous prussian bureaucracy which is also criticiseable even today and which still refuses to see the human beings behind all the documents.
Ever since the original incident from 1906, in German gossip the term Köpenickade"* is used to describe masquerades mainly to cheat authorities and/or to accomplish something which is actually your right but which you can't accomplish the straight way. But it is only used in these contexts when nobody came to harm.
From this fact-based theater-play by novelist Carl Zuckmayer there've been numerous screen- or TV-adaptions. You actually only need this one.
* Pronounced: Ko-Panic-Uh-De"
Now on the edge to retirement Voigt gets his pardon and goes free, the law knows he's too old to commit serious crimes. Equipped only with the releasing paper of the Ministry Of Justice he tries to get back into life, eager to finish it as a decent working man. But the paper though stamped and typed by the legal authorities- ain't accepted nowhere as a passport and isn't even meant to be swapped into one, not even at any communal registration office. And without passport: no job! Without registered employment: no passport! A vicious circle... Weeks of unregistered residence later the order to leave the country hits Voigt like a nail to the temple. Desperate about the authorities oppression he roams the streets and comes to a pawn-shop. He spots an abandoned captain's uniform (which in this film has had an own interesting story) in the window and puts his last money down for it. His age and the scholary lessons from prison make him appear like an experienced veteran, the uniform does a perpetuing job in the streets where no one would ever dare to question it's bearer. Even soldiers of lower rank submit to the uniform and the harsh commanding voice of the shoemaker who's sharpest weapon was that he simply had nothing more to loose. The uniformed Voigt hijacks a coincidentally patrolling imperial platoon and orders them to the city-hall of Köpenick (a suburb of the capitol Berlin). Under his command they set the building under siege while Voigt intends to get a couple of minutes alone at the registration-office to issue himself a real passport. That's when the true High-Command gets aware of the incident.
Heinz Rühmann who in his prime may have been for the Germans what Tom Hanks is for Americans these days- shows the essence of his acting-nature here: a humorous, always kind-hearted, simple man with a tragic halo who is nevertheless willing to find his place in life and to do anything for that, except harming other people. Der Hauptmann von Köpenick" is a brilliant and disarming masterpiece about the naive military-mania and the ridiculousness of blind obedience to uniforms and is generally even valuable about it these days. It also accuses the monstrous prussian bureaucracy which is also criticiseable even today and which still refuses to see the human beings behind all the documents.
Ever since the original incident from 1906, in German gossip the term Köpenickade"* is used to describe masquerades mainly to cheat authorities and/or to accomplish something which is actually your right but which you can't accomplish the straight way. But it is only used in these contexts when nobody came to harm.
From this fact-based theater-play by novelist Carl Zuckmayer there've been numerous screen- or TV-adaptions. You actually only need this one.
* Pronounced: Ko-Panic-Uh-De"