The broken heart

(1947)

A touching drama in two acts.

Cinema promotional film Van Nelle coffee and tea.

Story

Boy is in love with a girl, but girl surrenders to another with money. Rejected lover threatens to die of grief but is saved by his wise mother. She pours him Van Nelle coffee and tea.

The film opens as if watching a play. The different title state: "A touching drama. Presented by the theatrical association 'Brought together by love' and made into a film by Joop Geesink."

"Actors: A young man in love, a greedy girl, the mean rich man and a wise mother."
"First act"

"End of First Act" - "Second Act.
In which we see how a wise mother saves her son from the clutches of death."

"In his eyes is written, the miracle that healed him!" - "Van Nelle's coffee and tea, a class apart."

Trivia

This animated puppet film appeared a year after The Big Four (1946), for the same advertiser: Van Nelle.

Joop Geesink was very keen on selling a sequel after a successful start.
The approach here is an imaginary play. Again, a charming puppet animation showing the technical progress of Geesink and his employees.

This films is entirely staged at night. That required new techniques in building the sets and lighting them. Especially the combination of the dark (black) night and the white snow created enormous contrasts on the black and white film.

The film clearly shows technical progress. The scene where the young man walks through the snow and leaves his footprints is a beautiful shot, which will have caused some technical headaches.

This film brings much more atmosphere and character to the story the previous films.

Pionieering

The pioneering technique is recognizable with a close-up of the youngster's hand in which lies his broken heart. This shot shows that hands were made of textiles. The hand was formed by a small block of wood with a few pieces of copper wire as fingers. Over each wire came a piece of bicycle valve hose as flexible padding. Over this a glove was sewn from knit fabric. (See photo.)

Opening scene

The opening scene shows a gate with a flower lady next to it. An antique bicycle (the vélocipède) passes by and an old automobile. Then a young man stops near the flower lady.
Almost twenty years later this scene is repeated in the anniversary film "Philips Cavalcade - 75 Years of Music". But performed in a fantastic setting with many puppets. Again you see the antique vehicles, the same kind of fencing and the flower lady. All designed anew. By juxtaposing these two scenes, the great technical and artistic growth of Dollywood is portrayed.