Editing Joris Ivens (section)

==Career==
===Early work===
Originally his work was [[Constructivism (art)|constructivist]] in character, especially his short [[City symphony|city symphonies]] ''[[Rain (1929 film)|Rain]]'' (''Regen'', 1929), which he directed together with [[Mannus Franken]], filmed over two years, and ''[[De brug|The Bridge]]'' (''De Brug'', 1928). The latter was about a newly built elevator railway bridge in Rotterdam, shot in 1927, and shown in 1928 by the [[:nl:De Nederlandsche Filmliga|''Nederlandsche Filmliga'']] (Netherlands Film League) (1927–1933).<ref>{{Cite book |last=Paalman |first=Floris |title=Cinematic Rotterdam: The Times and Tides of a Modern City |publisher=010 Publishers |year=2011 |isbn=9789064507663 |location=Rotterdam |pages=72–73 |language=en}}</ref> This avant-garde cineclub, with its eponymous magazine, had just been established by Ivens, [[Menno ter Braak]], and others, with branches in different Dutch cities. ''The Bridge'' was part of its first season of film screenings, and received critical acclaim. The ''Filmliga'' drew various foreign filmmakers to the Netherlands, such as [[Alberto Cavalcanti]], [[René Clair]], [[Sergei Eisenstein]], [[Vsevolod Pudovkin]], and [[Dziga Vertov]], who also became Ivens' friends. Through these connections, ''The Bridge'' was widely shown abroad, including the Soviet Union.{{cn|date=February 2025}}

In 1929, Ivens went to the [[Soviet Union]] after being invited to present a lecture there,<ref name=eb/> and due to the success of ''The Bridge'', he was invited to direct a film on a topic of his own choosing, which was the new industrial city of [[Magnitogorsk]]. Before commencing work, he returned to the Netherlands to make ''Industrial Symphony'' for [[Philips|Philips Electric]], which is considered to be a film of great technical beauty.<ref>Erik Barnouw. Documentary. New York: Oxford University Press, 2nd revised edition, 1993. pp.: 133–134</ref> 

He returned to the Soviet Union to make the film about Magnitogorsk, ''Song of Heroes '' in 1931 with music composed by [[Hanns Eisler]]. This was the first film on which Ivens and Eisler worked together. It was a propaganda film about this new industrial city where masses of laborers and Communist youth worked for [[Stalin]]'s [[Five-year plans of the Soviet Union|Five Year Plan]].{{cn|date=February 2025}}

With [[Henri Storck]], Ivens made ''[[Misère au Borinage]]'' (''Borinage'', 1933), a documentary on life in a coal mining region. In 1943, he also directed two Allied propaganda films for the [[National Film Board of Canada]], including ''Action Stations'', about the [[Royal Canadian Navy]]'s escorting of convoys in the [[Battle of the Atlantic]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.nfb.ca/collection/films/resultat.php?type=fonction&idFcr=7845&idFct=01&nom=Joris+Ivens&nomfunc=Director |title=NFB - Collection |access-date=2007-08-21 |archive-date=2007-09-30 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070930201321/http://www.nfb.ca/collection/films/resultat.php?type=fonction&idFcr=7845&idFct=01&nom=Joris+Ivens&nomfunc=Director |url-status=dead }}</ref>
[[Image:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-84600-0001, Ivens und Hemingway bei Ludwig Renn, Chef der XI. Internationalen Brigaden.jpg|thumb|right|Joris Ivens (left) with [[Ernest Hemingway]] (middle) and [[Ludwig Renn]] in the [[Spanish Civil War]], 1936]]
Ivens met [[Ernest Hemingway]] and [[Ludwig Renn]] during the [[Spanish Civil War]] in 1936.{{cn|date=February 2025}}

===U.S. and World War II===
From 1936 to 1945, Ivens was based in the United States. For [[Pare Lorentz]]'s [[U.S. Film Service]], in the year 1940, he made a documentary film on [[rural electrification]] called ''Power and the Land''. It focused on a family, the Parkinsons, who ran a business providing milk for their community. The film showed the problem in the lack of electricity and the way the problem was fixed.{{cn|date=February 2025}}

Ivens was, however, better known for his anti-[[fascism|fascist]] and other [[propaganda film]]s, including the feature-length documentary ''[[The Spanish Earth]]'' (1937). This film was made for the Spanish [[Republican faction (Spanish Civil War)|Republican]] cause, co-written with [[Ernest Hemingway]], with music by [[Marc Blitzstein]] and [[Virgil Thomson]]. [[Jean Renoir]] did the French narration for the film and Hemingway did the English version (after [[Orson Welles]]' version had sounded too theatrical). This film was financed by [[Archibald MacLeish]], [[Fredric March]], [[Florence Eldridge]], [[Lillian Hellman]], [[Luise Rainer]], [[Dudley Nichols]], [[Franchot Tone]], and other Hollywood movie stars, moguls, and writers who composed a group known as the [[Contemporary Historians]]. '' The Spanish Earth '' was shown at the [[White House]] on 8 July 1937 after Ivens, Hemingway, and [[Martha Gellhorn]] had had dinner with President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]], [[Eleanor Roosevelt]], and [[Harry Hopkins]]. The Roosevelts loved the film but said that it needed more propaganda.{{citation needed|date=April 2013}} The film showed how the Republicans tried to hold on to freedoms which were threatened by the [[Falangists]], and their attempts to reclaim farmland which had been neglected for decades by [[absentee landlord]]s. Ivens produced the film for less than $10,000. This documentary was considered his masterpiece.<ref name=NYTobit/>

In 1938 he traveled to China. ''[[The 400 Million]]'' (1939) depicted the history of modern China and the Chinese resistance during the [[Second Sino-Japanese War]], including dramatic shots of the [[Battle of Taierzhuang]]. [[Robert Capa]] did camerawork, [[Sidney Lumet]] worked on the film as a reader, [[Hanns Eisler]] wrote the musical score, and [[Fredric March]] provided the narration. It had been financed by the same people who had supported ''Spanish Earth''. Its chief fundraiser was [[Luise Rainer]], recipient of the best actress [[Academy Award|Oscar]] two years in a row; and the entire group called themselves this time, ''History Today, Inc ''. The [[Kuomintang]] government censored the film, fearing that it would give too much credit to left-wing forces.<ref>European Foundation Joris Ivens. [http://www.ivens.nl/film39.htm Joris Ivens Filmography. ''The 400 Million''] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090220021535/http://www.ivens.nl/film39.htm |date=2009-02-20 }}</ref> Ivens was also suspected of being a friend of [[Mao Zedong]] and especially [[Zhou Enlai]].<ref>Martha Gellhorn. ''A Memoir: Travels with Myself and Another''. New York: Penguin Putnam, Inc, 1978. p.:52</ref>

In early 1943, [[Frank Capra]] hired Ivens to supervise the production of ''Know Your Enemy: Japan '' for his U.S. War Department film series ''[[Why We Fight]]''. The film's commentary was written largely by [[Carl Foreman]]. Capra fired Ivens from the project because he felt that his approach was too sympathetic toward the Japanese. The film's release was held up because there were concerns that emperor [[Hirohito]] was being depicted as a war criminal, and there was a policy shift to portray the emperor more favorably after the war{{dubious|This probably only concerned the last episode? All were shot before Japan's surrender! Or is it misleading, and meant to say: the US took into consideration in advance what the post-war impact might be?|date=April 2020}} as a means of maintaining order in post-war Japan.

With the emerging "[[First Red Scare|Red Scare]]" of the late 1940s, Ivens was forced to leave the country in the early months of the [[Truman administration]]. Ivens's leftist politics also put a stop to his first feature film project, which was to have starred [[Greta Garbo]]. [[Walter Wanger]], the film's producer, was adamant about "running [Ivens] out of town."{{Citation needed|date=May 2022}}

=== Return to Europe ===
[[File:Basil Wright, Joris Ivens, Elmar Klos i Jerzy Toeplitz - Film nr 55-56 - 1948-12-23.JPG|thumb|Conference of World Union of Documentary Films in Warsaw (1948): [[Basil Wright]] (left), [[Elmar Klos]], Joris Ivens (2nd from right) and [[Jerzy Toeplitz]] ]]
In 1946, commissioned to make a Dutch film about [[Indonesian independence]], Ivens resigned in protest over what he considered ongoing [[imperialism]]; the Dutch were in his view resisting decolonization. Instead, Ivens filmed ''[[Indonesia Calling]]'' in secret, for which he received funding from the [[International Workers Order]].<ref name=Musser>{{cite journal| first = Charles| last = Musser| author-link = Charles Musser| title = Carl Marzani and Union Films: Making Left-Wing Documentaries during the Cold War, 1946–53| journal = The Moving Image| publisher = University of Minnesota Press
| url = http://www.charlesmusser.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Musser-MarzaniandUnionFilms.pdf| pages = 104–160, 124 (Indonesia Calling)| date = 2009| access-date = 26 January 2020}}</ref> 

For around a decade Ivens lived in [[Eastern Europe]], working for several studios there.{{cn|date=February 2025}}

Having been criticized in the Netherlands, the tides were turning in the 1960s. In 1965, the city of [[Rotterdam]] commissioned him to make a film about the port, which was meant to be a promotional film, but Ivens got ''carte blanche''. The result, the essay-film ''Rotterdam Europoort'' (1966), is not only critical of modern city planning and consumerism, but also an autobiographical tale inspired by the legend of the [[Flying Dutchman]]. Ivens was very happy with the result and even believed that it was his best film.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Paalman |first=Floris |title=Cinematic Rotterdam: The Times and Tides of a Modern City |publisher=010 Publishers |year=2011 |isbn=9789064507663 |location=Rotterdam |pages=425 |language=en}}</ref> 

At about the same time, from 1965 to 1970, Ivens also worked on two documentary films about [[North Vietnam]] during the war; he made ''[[17e parallèle: La guerre du peuple]]'' ''(17th Parallel: Vietnam in War)'' and he participated in the collective work ''[[Loin du Vietnam]]'' (''Far from Vietnam'').{{cn|date=February 2025}} 

From 1971 to 1977, he shot ''[[How Yukong Moved the Mountains]]'', a 763-minute documentary about the [[Cultural Revolution]] in China.<ref>{{Cite web |title=How Yukong Moved the Mountain by Thomas Waugh |url=https://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/onlinessays/jc12-13folder/yukongmovedmt.html |access-date=2022-05-01 |website=www.ejumpcut.org}}</ref>

Shortly before his death in 1989, Ivens released the last of more than 40 films: ''[[Une histoire de vent]]'' (''A Tale of the Wind'').{{cn|date=February 2025}}