DAS FEUERZEUG (1959)
aka The Tinder-Box
Article 4031 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 9-13-2012
Directed by Siegfried Hartmann
Featuring Rolf Ludwig, Heinz Schubert, Rolf Defrank
Country: East Germany
What it is: Fairy tale

A wandering soldier discovers a magic hollowed-out tree where three giant dogs guard a fortune in gold. He decides to use his money to win the love of a princess, but when he loses his money, all he has left is a tinder-box that he also found in the tree. However, the tinder-box is far from ordinary…

For the third day in a row, I’m saddled with a foreign movie sans English subtitles. However, this one is a fairy tale, and I’ve discovered that these movies are some of the easiest to follow, since the plot elements are usually pretty familiar. I’ve not read the Hans Christian Andersen story this one is based on, but it’s very easy to scope out; it’s basically a variation on the Aladdin story. Some of these German fairy tale movies are pretty dull, but this one seems solid and charming, and is perhaps one of the better ones of its ilk. Furthermore, the special effects are actually pretty decent. I enjoyed this one, even with the language problems involved.