The Nazis chased them out. Hollywood's sound was never the same.
Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Hanns Eisler and Hans Julius Salter – driven out by the Nazi regime, these composers were able to gain a foothold in Hollywood and became pioneers of film music. The major film studios in the USA still use their epochal soundtracks, which are characterized by symphonic music. A young generation of Austrian musicians is continuing their work.
Score
Korngold's swashbuckling strings will ruin modern blockbusters for you.
Direction
Weissenbeck weaves archival gold with present-day passion projects.
Production
Gleaming orchestra footage makes 45 minutes feel cinematic.
Director
Barbara Weissenbeck
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Korngold's 1938 Oscar for 'The Adventures of Robin Hood' made him the first composer to win for original score—he treated film music as 'opera without singing.'
Eisler was deported from the US in 1948 during the Red Scare; his Hollywood career ended not by antisemitism but anti-communism, making his story the most politically complex of the three.
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