Wissenswertes

With the downfall of the Third Reich not only his career came to an end but Steinhoff also lost his life. During the shootings of "Shiva und die Galgenblume" in Prague he fled on an airplane to Berlin and later to Madrid. On the flight to Madrid the airplane was shot down by fighters, and Steinhoff as well as all other passengers onboard, died.

Some of Steinhoff's movie are still regarded as "Vorbehaltsfilme", and are not allowed to be performed in public.

The transition to the sound film was no problem for him and he remained a busy movie director till to the end of World War II.

German director. Steinhoff turned out many Nazi propaganda films, from the early 1930's until his death in a plane crash in 1945. His career had begun as an actor on the stage in 1903. He later turned to stage direction in Berlin and Vienna, entering films in 1921.

Steinhoff entered the film business in 1921, and wrote the screenplay and directed Kleider machen Leute (1921). He became fascinated by directing movies as well and he realised many silent movies in the years years.

Steinhoff is considered controversial because he not only followed the ideology of the National Socialists, but lived it. He was not very popular amongst many film workers of the time, and there are negative statements from several personalities, including Billy Wilder, Hans Albers and Geza von Cziffra. On the other hand, Steinhoff was never a member of the NSDAP despite his bondage to Josef Goebbels and Adolf Hitler.

Steinhoff planned to become a doctor but abandoned his studies, instead concentrated on acting. He made his stage debut at a theater in Braunschweig in 1903. In the next years, he performed in Munich and Berlin, where he not only was he active as an actor, but as a director of plays.