Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet | |
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![]() 1940 Theatrical Poster | |
Directed by | William Dieterle |
Written by | Norman Burnstine Heinz Herald John Huston |
Produced by | Hal B. Wallis Jack L. Warner Wolfgang Reinhardt (executive producer) |
Starring | Edward G. Robinson Ruth Gordon Otto Kruger Donald Crisp |
Cinematography | James Wong Howe |
Edited by | Warren Low |
Music by | Max Steiner |
Distributed by | Warner Bros. Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 103 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet is a 1940 American biographical film starring Edward G. Robinson and directed by William Dieterle, based on the true story of the German doctor and scientist Dr. Paul Ehrlich. The film was released by Warner Bros., with some controversy over raising the subject of syphilis in a major studio release. It was nominated for an Oscar for its original screenplay (by Norman Burnstine, Heinz Herald and John Huston), but lost to The Great McGinty .
Paul Ehrlich is a physician working in a German hospital. He is dismissed for his constant disregard for hospital rules, which are bound by bureaucratic red tape. The reason for his conflict is his steadily rising interest in research for selective color staining, the marking of cells and microorganisms using certain dyes and marking agents which have a certain 'affinity' for their target and nothing else. Emil von Behring, whom Dr. Ehrlich meets and befriends while experimenting with his staining techniques, is impressed with Dr. Ehrlich's staining methods and refers to it as 'specific staining,' adding that this optical microscopy diagnostic technique is one of the greatest achievements in science.
After attending a medical presentation of the eminent Dr. Robert Koch demonstrating that tuberculosis is a bacterial disease, Ehrlich is able to obtain a sample of the isolated bacterium. After an intense time of research and experimentation in his own lab, paired with a portion of luck and thanks to the empathy of his wife, he is able to develop a viable staining process for the microbe. This result is honored by Koch and medical circles as another highly valuable contribution to diagnostics.
During his work Dr. Ehrlich is infected with tuberculosis, then an often-deadly, uncurable disease. To recover, Ehrlich travels with his wife Hedwig to the hot dry climate of Egypt. There he starts to discover the properties of immunity. This discovery helps Ehrlich and colleague Dr. von Behring to fight a diphtheria epidemic that is killing off many children in the country. The two doctors are rewarded for their efforts.
Ehrlich concentrates on work to create "magic bullets" - chemicals injected into the blood to fight various diseases, thus pioneering antibiotic chemotherapy for infectious diseases. Ehrlich's laboratory has the help of a number of scientists like Sahachiro Hata. The medical board, headed by Dr. Hans Wolfert, believes much of Ehrlich's work is a waste of money and resources and fight for a reduction, just as Ehrlich begins to work on a cure for syphilis. Ehrlich is financially backed by the widow of Jewish banker Georg Speyer, Franziska Speyer, and after 606 tries he finally discovers the remedy for the disease. This substance, first called "606", then Salvarsan, is now known as Arsphenamine.
The joy of discovery is short-lived, as 38 patients who receive the treatment die. Dr. Wolfert denounces the cure publicly and accuses Ehrlich of murdering those who died from the cure. As faith in the new cure starts to dwindle, Ehrlich is forced to sue Wolfert for libel and in the process exonerate 606. Dr. von Behring (who had earlier told Ehrlich to give up his pipe dreams of cures by chemicals), is called by the defense to denounce 606. Behring instead states that he believes that 606 is responsible for a 39th death: the death of syphilis itself. Ehrlich is exonerated, but the strain and stress from the trial are too much for his weakened body and he dies shortly thereafter, his final words being counsel to his assistants and colleagues on the risks involved in advancing medicine.
Warner Bros. Studios was concerned about Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet because it was about a venereal disease, syphilis, and because Ehrlich was Jewish. This was before the U.S. entry into the Second World War. Warner Bros. did not want the movie to be political or seem to have a Jewish agenda since Germany was still a market for American films. However, Warner Bros. had already produced a series of medical biographical films during the 1930s, including the Dieterle-directed The Story of Louis Pasteur (1935) and The White Angel (1936) about Florence Nightingale. In addition, U.S. Surgeon General Thomas Parran Jr. had in late 1936 begun a syphilis control campaign to get the public to consider it to be a medical condition and not a moral failure, suggesting that a film on Ehrlich' life would be acceptable. [1]
Ehrlich was one of the greatest Jewish doctors, and in 1908 his work on immunity won a Nobel Prize. [2] However, the Nazi regime in Germany had systematically expunged all memory of Ehrlich from public buildings and street signs and censored books referring to him. The Second World War had already begun but the United States was not yet directly involved. Jack Warner, like other Hollywood moguls, was wary of criticism of pursuing any supposedly "Jewish" agenda on the screen. A memorandum circulated by the studio bosses stated with regard to the forthcoming Ehrlich movie: "It would be a mistake to make a political propaganda picture out of a biography which could stand on its own feet." So the words "Jew" and "Jewish" went entirely unmentioned in the film. Anti-Semitism in Ehrlich's life was no more than hinted at, and then only once or twice. In addition, the original version of the deathbed scene was changed so that Ehrlich no longer would refer to the Pentateuch (books of Moses in the Bible). Nevertheless, the film's story writer Norman Burnside declared "There isn't a man or woman alive who isn't afraid of syphilis, and let them know that a little kike named Ehrlich tamed the scourge. And maybe they can persuade their hoodlum friends to keep their fists off Ehrlich's coreligionists."
One prohibited topic of the Motion Picture Production Code adopted in 1930 was "sex hygiene and venereal diseases" and after 1934 studios were required to submit films to the Production Code Administration for approval. Aware of the restrictions of the Code, Warner executives seriously considered not mentioning the word "syphilis" in the movie. However, Hal B. Wallis, Warner Bros. head of production, while advising caution, wrote to the PCA that "to make a dramatic picture of the life of Dr. Ehrlich and not include this discovery [the anti-syphilis drug Salvarsan] among his great achievements would be unfair to the record." Following negotiations, the film received approval under the Production Code provided no scenes showing treatment of patients with syphilis were shown, and advertising of the film could not mention syphilis. [1]
The movie's title role star Edward G. Robinson, himself Jewish, was keenly aware of the increasingly desperate situation of the Jews in Germany and Europe, and anxious for the opportunity to break out of the police and gangster roles in which he was in danger of being forever stereotyped. He met with Paul Ehrlich's daughter who had fled to the US and he corresponded with Ehrlich's widow, who was a refugee in Switzerland. "During the filming," Robinson later recalled with regard to his role as Ehrlich: "I kept to myself, studied the script, practiced gestures before the mirror, read about his life and times, studied pictures of the man, tried to put myself in his mental state, tried to be him." [3]
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The film is recognized by American Film Institute in these lists:
Paul Ehrlich was a Nobel Prize-winning German physician and scientist who worked in the fields of hematology, immunology, and antimicrobial chemotherapy. Among his foremost achievements were finding a cure for syphilis in 1909 and inventing the precursor technique to Gram staining bacteria. The methods he developed for staining tissue made it possible to distinguish between different types of blood cells, which led to the ability to diagnose numerous blood diseases.
Emil von Behring, born Emil Adolf Behring, was a German physiologist who received the 1901 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, the first one awarded in that field, for his discovery of a diphtheria antitoxin. He was widely known as a "saviour of children," as diphtheria used to be a major cause of child death. His work with the disease, as well as tetanus, has come to bring him most of his fame and acknowledgment. He was honored with Prussian nobility in 1901, henceforth being known by the surname "von Behring."
The Story of Louis Pasteur is a 1936 American black-and-white biographical film from Warner Bros., produced by Henry Blanke, directed by William Dieterle, that stars Josephine Hutchinson, Anita Louise and Donald Woods, and Paul Muni as the renowned scientist who developed major advances in microbiology, which revolutionized agriculture and medicine. The film's screenplay—which tells a highly fictionalized version of Pasteur’s life—was written by Pierre Collings and Sheridan Gibney, and Edward Chodorov (uncredited).
Arsphenamine, also known as Salvarsan or compound 606, is a drug that was introduced at the beginning of the 1910s as the first effective treatment for syphilis, relapsing fever, and African trypanosomiasis. This organoarsenic compound was the first modern antimicrobial agent.
Edward G. Robinson was a Romanian-American actor of stage and screen, who was popular during the Hollywood's Golden Age. He appeared in 30 Broadway plays and more than 100 films during a 50-year career and is best remembered for his tough-guy roles as gangsters in such films as Little Caesar and Key Largo. During his career, Robinson received the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor for his performance in House of Strangers.
Albert Ludwig Sigesmund Neisser was a German physician who discovered the causative agent (pathogen) of gonorrhea, a strain of bacteria that was named in his honour.
Magic bullet may refer to:
William Dieterle was a German-born actor and film director who emigrated to the United States in 1930 to leave a worsening political situation. He worked in Hollywood primarily as a director for much of his career, becoming a United States citizen in 1937. He moved back to Germany in the late 1950s.
Arsanilic acid, also known as aminophenyl arsenic acid or aminophenyl arsonic acid, is an organoarsenic compound, an amino derivative of phenylarsonic acid whose amine group is in the 4-position. A crystalline powder introduced medically in the late 19th century as Atoxyl, its sodium salt was used by injection in the early 20th century as the first organic arsenical drug, but it was soon found prohibitively toxic for human use.
Neosalvarsan is a synthetic chemotherapeutic that is an organoarsenic compound. It became available in 1912 and superseded the more toxic and less water-soluble salvarsan as an effective treatment for syphilis. Because both of these arsenicals carried considerable risk of side effects, they were replaced for this indication by penicillin in the 1940s.
Paul Henry de Kruif was an American microbiologist and author of Dutch descent. Publishing as Paul de Kruif, he is most noted for his 1926 book, Microbe Hunters. This book was not only a bestseller for a lengthy period after publication, but has remained high on lists of recommended reading for science and has been an inspiration for many aspiring physicians and scientists.
Sahachirō Hata was a prominent Japanese bacteriologist who researched the bubonic plague under Kitasato Shibasaburō and assisted in developing the Arsphenamine drug in 1909 in the laboratory of Paul Ehrlich.
Egon Brecher was an Austria-Hungary-born actor and director, who also served as the chief director of Vienna's Stadttheater, before entering the motion picture industry.
Herbert Anderson was an American character actor from Oakland, California, probably best remembered for his role as Henry Mitchell, the father, on the CBS television sitcom Dennis the Menace.
Louis V. Arco was an Austrian stage and film actor whose career began in the late 1910s.
Magic Fire is a 1955 American biographical film about the life of composer Richard Wagner, released by Republic Pictures.
Paul Theodor Uhlenhuth was a German bacteriologist and immunologist, and Professor at the University of Strasbourg (1911–1918), at the University of Marburg (1918–1923) and at the University of Freiburg (1923–1936). He was rector of the University of Freiburg 1928–1929. After his retirement in 1936, he led his own research institute in Freiburg, known as the State Research Laboratory, until his death in 1957.
Wolfgang Zilzer was a German-American stage and film actor, often under the stage name Paul Andor.
Wilhelm Kolle was a German bacteriologist and hygienist. He served as the second director of the Royal Institute for Experimental Therapy, succeeding its founder, the Nobel laureate Paul Ehrlich. He was also the original author, with Heinrich Hetsch, of the famous book Experimental Bacteriology, one of the most authoritative works in microbiology in the first half of the 20th century.
The magic bullet is a scientific concept developed by a German Nobel laureate Paul Ehrlich in 1907. While working at the Institute of Experimental Therapy, Ehrlich formed an idea that it could be possible to kill specific microbes, which cause diseases in the body, without harming the body itself. He named the hypothetical agent as Zauberkugel, and used the English translation "magic bullet" in The Harben Lectures at London. The name itself is a reference to an old German myth about a bullet that cannot miss its target. Ehrlich had in mind Carl Maria von Weber's popular 1821 opera Der Freischütz, in which a young hunter is required to hit an impossible target in order to marry his bride.