U.S. lobby card for the film “The Mortal Storm" (1940)
Extent and Medium
Overall: Height: 11.000 inches (27.94 cm) | Width: 14.000 inches (35.56 cm)
Creator(s)
- Ken Sutak (Compiler)
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (Production Company)
Biographical History
The Cinema Judaica Collection consists of more than 1,200 objects relating to films about World War II and the Holocaust as well as Jewish, Israeli, and biblical subjects, from 1923 to 2000, from the United States, Europe, Israel, Canada, Mexico, and Argentina. The collection was amassed by film memorabilia collector Ken Sutak, to document Holocaust-and Jewish-themed movies of the World War II era and the postwar years. The collection includes posters, lobby and photo cards, scene stills, pressbooks, trade ads, programs, magazines, books, VHS tapes, DVDS, and 78 rpm records. Sutak organized these materials into two groups, “Cinema Judaica: The War Years, 1939–1949” and “Cinema Judaica: The Epic Cycle, 1950–1972” and, in conjunction with the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion Museum (now the Dr. Bernard Heller Museum in New York), organized exhibitions on these two themes in 2007 and 2008. Sutak subsequently authored companion books with the same titles.
Archival History
The lobby card was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2018 by Ken Sutak and Sherri Venokur.
Acquisition
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Ken Sutak and Sherri Venokur
Scope and Content
Lobby card for the American feature film, “The Mortal Storm,” released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) in June 1940. Lobby cards were promotional materials placed in theater lobby windows to highlight specific movie scenes, rather than the broader themes often depicted on posters. “The Mortal Storm,” based on a 1938 novel of the same name, was MGM’s first film that openly criticized Nazi Germany. Beginning in 1933, just after Hitler’s appointment as chancellor, it features a Jewish professor of medicine and his daughter, whose fiancé and stepbrothers join the Nazi party. The professor is sent to a concentration camp, while his daughter attempts to cross the Austrian border with a former student of her father’s. The writers of the screenplay were themselves refugees from Nazi Germany. After the movie’s release, German propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels ordered the Berlin office of MGM’s parent company, Lowe’s, to close. He also banned the film (as well as subsequent MGM films) in all German-occupied territories. This object is one of more than 1,200 objects in the Cinema Judaica Collection of materials related to films about World War II and the Holocaust as well as Jewish, Israeli, and biblical themes.
Conditions Governing Access
No restrictions on access
Conditions Governing Reproduction
Restrictions on use. Copyright status is unknown.
Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements
Lobby card with a photographic image printed on rectangular, off-white paper for the film “The Mortal Storm. A white border surrounds the image, which depicts a red-haired woman sitting between two dark-haired men at a table. The men are staring at each other, while the woman is looking at the man on the right. They are sitting inside a restaurant with water glasses and a bread basket on the table in front of them. In the bottom left corner, an illustration of a tilted red and blue book with the film title is printed in white letters. In the book’s bottom right corner is a logo for the studio inside a yellow circle. The names of the principal actors are printed in orange and yellow in a black banner below the image. Several lines of blue text are printed in the margin on the left side, and a single line of blue text is printed in the bottom right margin. There are pinholes along the upper margin and within the upper image, and many small creases and tears along the edges of the card. On the back, there is ink transfer on the lower half. Left to right: James Stewart as Martin Breitner, Margaret Sullavan as Freya Roth, and Robert Young as Fritz Marberg
People
- Stewart, James, 1908-1997.
- Morgan, Frank, 1890-1949.
- Sullavan, Margaret, 1909-1960.
- Young, Robert, 1907-1998.
Subjects
- Germany.
- Nazis in motion pictures.
- National socialism in motion pictures.
- Film adaptations.
- World War (1939-1945)
- Anti-war films.
- Armed Forces in motion pictures.
- Historical films.
- Nazis--United States--Drama.
- Austria.
- Motion pictures--History--20th century.
- Soldiers in motion pictures.
- Germans in motion pictures.
Genre
- Object
- Posters
- Display Cards.