ZEIT IM BILD: U-BOOTE [Main Title]

Assembly of film relating to German submarine development includes sequence on pre-WW1 submarine and sections from the 1917 cruise of U-35 and from the 1940 dramatisation U-BOOTE AM FEIND.

I. Reel starts with joined titles ZEIT IM BILD and U-BOOTE, which may indicate remainder of reel is a survey on submarine warfare in this wartime series. Statue head of first German submarine engineer, Wilhelm Bauer. Model of pre-WW1 submarine, marked "Angefertigt 1908 von Max Marx, Mechaniker, Berlin". Interior of model submarine. Portrait of WW1 German naval ace wearing Pour le Mërite. Pre-WW1 submarine with pennants and tilting funnel emitting black smoke steams through sea on trials. View of engine room, where German sailor with "--- Abteilung" capband stands.

II. Crew of U-35, under command of Lothar von Arnauld de la Perière, stand on conning tower then fire on enemy freighter. Name of Brisbane River (sunk on 17/4/17) is crossed through on Lloyd's Register. Sailing ship Miss Morris (11/4/17) and another freighter are sunk by U-35's deck gun.

III. Tracking shot shows interior of vast U-boat assembly yard, where U-boat sections are being welded together. Montage of three separate launchings of U-boats. Exterior and interior views of training establishment for U-boat crews, seen receiving classroom instruction and practising emergency escape from submerged submarine mock-up. Torpedoes are lifted aboard moored U-boat by dock-side crane and stowed on board. Type IX U-boat with crew on deck passes liner St Louis in port. Type VII at sea. Albatross in flight.

IV. Abbreviated version of U-BOOTE AM FEIND opens with three Type VII U-boats steaming in line ahead through heavy sunlit sea. Alarm sequence has crew rushing up through conning tower to man deck gun. Sailor wears Flotilla Hundius capband. Shells are passed up and fired at ship, now smouldering. Cut-in of two rowing boats, presumably survivors about to be rescued. Alarm called as destroyers approach and depth charge explodes. Depth gauge suggests emergency dive. Deschimag 1939 nameplate. Fat commander looks through periscope as U-boat surfaces and steams through heavy seas.

35mm