Filmmaker Peter Webber, who directed the Oscar-nominated film ‘Girl With The Pearl Earring’, will direct an upcoming film about the family behind the Leica camera brand, who helped many Jewish people escape Germany in World War II.
Founded in 1869 by Ernst Leitz, Leica began as a manufacturer of microscopic lenses before Ernst Leitz II began mass-producing the first 35mm compact camera. Optical engineer Oskar Barnack had been working on the designs for over twenty years, and the camera was revered by photographers such as Henri Cartier-Bresson.
