THE CABINET OF DR.
CALIGARI
****
Germany
People tend to be happier to talk about this famously Expressionistic
relic than they are to sit through it. Among the earliest of deeply
pretentious arthouse pictures, its reputation seems to generally be based
on its conception more than on its execution.
Werner Krauss sports evil-professor-spectacles and a black
cloak with great panache as the sinister Dr. Caligari, with long-limbed,
emaciated Conrad Veidt
playing Cesare, his somnambulist pawn. The
legendary sets - designed by Walter Reimann, Walter Röhrig and Hermann
Warm - are hysterically mashed and disjointed, with distorted
perspectives, painted shadows and delirious zigzags to reflect the mind of
a madman.
Director Robert Wiene's point-and-shoot aesthetic however,
has a tendency to rob the scenery of the nightmarish mood that Reimann and
Co. had so painstakingly been working towards. The supporting cast's
stilted, slow-mo grimacing further suffocates the picture. But when it
comes alive - which it does mostly in patches involving the somnambulist -
it's eerie on a primal level.
dir: Robert Wiene
wr: Carl Mayer, Hans Janowitz
ph: Willy Hameister
ad: Walter Reimann, Walter Röhrig, Hermann Warm
cast: Werner Krauss, Conrad Veidt, Friedrich Feher, Lil
Dagover, Hans Heinz von Twardovski, Rudolf Klein-Rogge
DER GOLEM
****½
Germany
You can recognise a lot of "Frankenstein" in this most famous
version of an oft-filmed story concerning a rabbi in 16th century Prague,
who seeks the help of
some suspicious forces to create an invincible superhero from clay in
order to save the Jews from persecution. The pudgy fellow he comes up with
would surely run off screaming if faced with Boris Karloff in full monster
makeup, but in many ways, this this early Expressionist variation on the
Prometheus formula is more impressive than James Whale's 1931 classic.
The sets
are magnificent and masterfully photographed.
dir: Paul Wegener, Carl Boese
ph: Karl Freund, Guido Seeber
ad: Hans Poelzig
cast: Paul Wegener, Albert Steinrück, Ernst Deutsch, Lyda
Salmonova
|
THE PHANTOM CHARIOT
****
Sweden
A sentimental, sanctimonious melodrama - about an abusive drunk, who is knocked out and receives a
visit from death's phantom chariot - made memorable by an ambitious, non-linear
narrative structure and striking visuals.
dir: Victor Sjöström
cast: Victor Sjöström, Hilda Borgström, Tore Svennberg,
Astrid Holm, Lisa Lundholm, Olof Ås, Tor Weijden
THE SAPHEAD
***
USA
This tale of the naive, spoiled son of a silver mine owner who aspires to win the love of his father's
ward is remembered chiefly for providing Keaton with his first opportunity to
star in a feature length vehicle. He's sympathetic throughout but the film
only comes alive during a sequence where he stumbles into the stock market.
dir: Herbert Blanché
cast: Buster Keaton, William H. Crane, Carol
Holloway, Edward Connelly, Irving Cummings, Beulah Booker
THE SPIDERS, PART 2: THE DIAMOND
SHIP
**
Germany
In this second of a planned series of four parts,
Kay Hoog's wife is murdered by the Spiders and he seeks revenge while
searching for a priceless lost diamond.
Of the two that were completed, this is the weaker one - though it does boast a
plot involving a hypnotic-telepathic experiment with an Indian clairvoyant as well as
impeccably precise carrier pigeons.
dir: Fritz Lang
cast: Carl de Vogt, Ressel Orla, Georg John, Bruno Lettinger
WAY DOWN EAST
***
WITHIN OUR GATES
**
USA
A Southern Negro teacher goes to the North seeking financial help to
continue the education of black students.
The earliest surviving film by an African-American filmmaker makes for
a perfectly primitive melodrama with heavy-handed - if often progressive -
political messages.
dir: Oscar Micheaux
cast: Evelyn Preer, Flo Clements, James D. Ruffin, Jack
Chenault, William Smith, Charles D. Lucas
|