Sunday, October 2, 2016

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)


He’s really dead. She’s really a he. He is his mother’s killer. She is her sister’s mother. All of them did it. No one gets out alive.

And then there’s the all-time favorite surprise ending: It was only a dream. Or a nightmare.

You can trace the latter trick all the way back to the dawn of the silent-movie era, and follow its various permutations even beyond the audacious turnabout that signaled Bobby Ewing’s return to Dallas. But when you’re cataloguing the most significant cinematic deceptions, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari deserves special mention. This 1920 German fantasia represents the first meaningful attempt to fuse Expressionistic style and conventional substance in a commercial film. Just as important, however, is the movie’s seminal success at pulling the rug out from under its audience.

Indeed, even the people who wrote it claimed they were surprised by what happens in its final scene.

Caligari begins prosaically enough, with handsome Francis (Friedrich Feher), seated next to a stranger on a park bench, promising to tell a stranger about an adventure he shared with Jane (Lil Dagover) – his beautiful fiancée, who just happens to be passing by -- in their small German town of Holstenwall.

Once Francis begins his tale, however, the film shifts into a phantasmagorical fantasyland, as characters go through their paces in an Expressionistic universe of distorted perspectives, asymmetrical doorways, crooked windows, sloping chimneys -- and streaks of light and shadow painted across tilted walls. Officious bureaucrats sit atop enormously high stools, frowning down upon fawning supplicants. Sleepwalkers stagger across impossibly slanting rooftops, and through forebodingly twisted forests.

Take note of the many angled shapes and pointed objects that, right from the start, are sprinkled throughout the film. (Visual allusions, perhaps, to the dagger wielded lethally in key scenes?) These sharp geometric figures convey a pervading sense of danger and evil, serving as exceptionally potent portents in a movie teeming with scenery that often threatens to chew up the actors.

(In his audio essay for the film’s DVD release, scholar Mike Budd persuasively argues that Caligari was the first moving picture to introduce Expressionism to the masses, and movies to Europe’s intellectual elite. On the other hand, critic Pauline Kael was no less persuasive when she noted that, while Caligari is “one of the most famous films of all time” and “a radical advance in film technique,” the German masterpiece “is rarely imitated -- and you’ll know why.”)

Against this bizarre backdrop, director Robert Wiene unfolds a comparatively mundane horror story about Dr. Caligari (Werner Krauss in outlandish make-up and Mickey Mouse gloves), a sideshow charlatan who causes murder and mayhem in Holstenwall with the help of his star attraction, a somnambulist named Cesare (Conrad Veidt, who would later cause trouble for Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca).

These prototypical bogeymen – cinematic templates for succeeding generations of manipulative mad scientists and, more recently, Halloween-style indestructible death-dealers -- are perfectly in sync with the stylized make-up and scenic design. At least, that’s the view espoused by film historian Lotte H. Eisner in The Haunted Screen: Expressionism in German Cinema and the Influence of Max Reinhardt (1952). Insisting that the “characters of Caligari and Cesare conform to Expressionist conception,” Eisner elaborates: “The somnambulist, detached from his everyday ambience, deprived of all individuality, an abstract creature, kills without motive or logic. And his master, the mysterious Dr. Caligari, who lacks the merest shadow of human scruple, acts with the criminal insensibility and defiance of conventional morality which the Expressionists exalted.”

Cesare -- whose unnaturally white face, heavily mascaraed eyes and black-on-black wardrobe suggest a Goth-influenced bit player from Night of the Living Dead, or a first draft of Edward Scissorhands – pops out of Dr. Caligari’s cabinet to answer audience questions during a fairground show. Unfortunately, Francis and Alan (Hans Heinrich), Francis’ friendly rival for Jane’s affections, are among the curious onlookers when Cesare makes his Holstenwall debut. Even more unfortunately, Alan asks an imprudent question (“How long have I to live?”) and gets an immediate answer: “Until tomorrow’s dawn…”

Sure enough, Alan comes to an untimely end shortly after staying too long at the fair. Francis, no fool, figures things might not be on the up-and-up with the good doctor and his black-clad accomplice. So he returns to the fairground, only to glimpse a heartwarming tableau: Dr. Caligari, fawning over Cesare like a kindly mother, feeding broth to his charge in the privacy of their caravan. Hardly anything incriminating, Francis figures. More to the point, with Alan out of the picture, Francis now has exclusive dating rights to the beautiful Jane.

As the body count mounts in Holstenwall, however, Francis feels compelled to avenge his late friend -- and, naturally, protect his beloved Jane – by joining the local police in a hunt for whoever’s behind the killing spree. The clues lead to Cesare, and beyond him to Caligari. The trail ends at an insane asylum, where Caligari is revealed as not merely a patient, but rather the deeply disturbed director of the institution.

But then, just when it looks like everyone – except Cesare and Dr. Caligari, of course – will live happily ever after, the movie opens a trapdoor: The entire melodrama is the product of Frances’ fevered imagination. In the final scene, we discover the nominal hero is in fact a delusional patient in a loony bin operated by a benevolent Director who looks just like – ta-dah! – the malevolent Dr. Caligari. “At last,” the Director exclaims, “I understand the nature of his madness. He thinks I am that mystic Caligari. Now I see how he can be brought back to sanity again…” Authority is validated, order is restored.

In 1920, this climactic twist stunned audiences – and infuriated the film’s screenwriters.

Austrian scenarist Carl Mayer and Czech poet Hans Janowitz originally conceived Caligari as a cautionary allegory aimed at audiences still recovering from the ravages of World War I. As far as they were concerned, Caligari personified an unlimited state authority that idolizes power, while Cesare represented, in Janowitz’s words, “the common man who, under the pressure of military service, is drilled to kill and be killed.” When Francis unmasks Caligari, his triumph shows that – again, in Janowitz’s words – “reason overpowers unreasonable power.”

Trouble was, neither director Wiene nor producer Erich Pommer felt altogether comfortable with the ramifications of the original script. They feared retaliation by any powerful people who might interpret the allegory as a personal attack. More important, they worried that audiences would respond unfavorably to anything that reminded them, even indirectly, of the everyday horrors lurking just outside the movie theater.

You see, during the 1919-1933 heyday of the Weimar Republic, a period now widely recognized as a golden age for German cinema, many of the filmmakers’ countrymen felt they were living a wide-awake nightmare. A sudden spurt of inflation could impoverish almost anyone in a matter of weeks, if not days. Women and children were driven to prostitution, often with the tacit approval of their needy families. Street brawls between Communists and National Socialists occurred frequently enough to qualify as spectator sports. The grand experiment in postwar democracy simply wasn’t working. Or, perhaps more accurately, wasn’t allowed to work.

Much like audiences in Depression-ravaged America, Weimar-era Germans sought escape from harsh realities by seeking escapism at the movies. Historical romances, costume dramas and lavish epics based on ancient legends were prime box-office attractions. Equally popular, however, were dramas of the macabre and fantastical – tales of horror, phantasms and science fiction – that allowed audiences a safe way to savor catharsis through the playing out of worst-case scenarios.

At such a time, in such a place, folks might like to exorcise their worst well-founded fears by enjoying a scary melodrama about a modern-day wizard and his murderous cat’s-paw. What folks most assuredly wouldn’t like, Wiene and Pommer decided, was a movie that could inspire “dangerously radical” notions about government and the governed.

Which is why, despite fervent protestations by Mayer and Janowitz, the allegorical nightmare was transformed into a striking but safely apolitical dreamscape. Specifically, Wiene and Pommer – aided by filmmaker Fritz Lang (M, Metropolis), who freely offered detailed script suggestions, and had originally considered directing Caligari himself – contrived the device of wraparound scenes that identify Francis as a paranoid fantasist.

With the invaluable collaboration of production designers Hermann Warm, Walter Reimann and Walter Rohrig, Wiene offers in Caligari a boldly stylized rendering of “reality” as viewed through the eyes of a madman. And if the director undercuts his own “explanation” by depicting the supposedly “real” reality of the opening and closing scenes in the same unrealistic manner, well, chalk it up to Wiene’s compulsive showmanship.

But consider this: A decade or so after the 1920 premiere of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Adolf Hitler underscored the prescience of Mayer and Janowitz by demonstrating just how easily a mesmerist could cloud the minds of the masses. As German film historian Siegfried Kracauer notes in his aptly titled From Caligari to Hitler: A Psychological History of the German Film (1947), the Expressionistic silent classic “is a very specific premonition, in the sense that (Dr. Caligari) uses hypnotic power to force his will upon his tool – a technique foreshadowing, in content and purpose, that manipulation of the soul which Hitler was the first to practice on a gigantic scale.”

Thereby proving, alas, that the scariest nightmares are those from which you cannot awaken.

63 comments:

  1. Dr. Caligari is the nice personality you are discussing about. I like his all publications and other works.
    goodnight funny pictures

    ReplyDelete
  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thank you for your post, I look for such article along time, today i find it finally. this post give me lots of advise it is very useful for me

    whatsapp baixar

    ReplyDelete
  4. Oh my goodness! Amazing article dude! Many thanks, However I am having troubles with your RSS. I don’t understand the reason why I am unable to subscribe to it. Is there anybody else having similar RSS issues? Anybody who knows the answer will you kindly respond? Thanks!!
    Morenos Tires & Suspension Int Working Hours
    Blue Swallow Motel Near Me in Locations

    ReplyDelete
  5. I love it. I hope that more and more Blogger will use this feature in the future, because it just makes the internet better I think!

    RRB Secunderabad Result 2017
    How to Check RRB Ranchi NTPC Result 2017

    ReplyDelete
  6. It is terribly simple to finding United States as we generally tend to rectangular measure at your city or nearest locations
    check cashing

    ReplyDelete
  7. Nice Article Very Helpful ! Thanks for sharing ! Also check gbwhatsapp

    ReplyDelete
  8. this article looks quite comprehensive. try game killer now.

    ReplyDelete
  9. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Every day I follow your new articles and I'm very impressed, congratulations , you have a great blog.
    Gbwhatsapp apk

    ReplyDelete

  11. Awesome and informative article!
    Just do check out -
    VivaVideo Pro Apk by Apk Hx

    ReplyDelete

  12. Game Guardian is an amazing game hack/alteration tool. Game guardian helps you modify money, HP, Sp and more aspects of the game.
    Game Guardian android

    ReplyDelete
  13. https://snap-seed.blogspot.in/2017/10/snapseed-best-photo-editing-application.html?m=1

    ReplyDelete

  14. An intriguing discussion is worth comment. To the next! Kind regards!!
    ipl auction 2018

    ReplyDelete

  15. Top 10 Tips to Stay Healthy

    WELCOME to Hindi Web World this website covers different topics related to health tips, movie reviews, bollywood
    gossips, hindi quotes, jokes, indian leaders, bhakti.i hope you will enjoy reading it.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Gangstar Vegas is an open world action-adventure video game developed by Gameloft for Android, iOS.
    gangstar vegas for pc

    ReplyDelete
  17. nice article thanks for the sharing
    visit also railway group d vacancy

    ReplyDelete
  18. Packers And Movers Hyderabad Local Household Shifting Service, Get Free Best Price Quotes Local Packers and Movers in Hyderabad List, Compare Charges, Save Money And Time.
    Packers And Movers in Hyderabad

    ReplyDelete
  19. Nice Article thanks for posting .
    I found some interesting on Telangana History
    Telangana History GK

    ReplyDelete
  20. Nice blog.. Thanks for sharing.. Check also for GBWHATSAPP

    ReplyDelete
  21. Nice sir very nice
    https://ipoemworld.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete



  22. Thanks for sharing this post, it was great reading this article! would like to know more! keep in touch and stay connected
    Lucky Patcher
    whatsapp plus
    Blackmart
    apktroll

    ReplyDelete
  23. Call girls in karachi


    Escorts in karachi

    Escorts service in karachi

    Karachi escorts

    Karachi call girls

    Call girls in karachi

    Escorts in karachi

    Karachi escorts

    Karachi call girls

    [url=https://www-callgirlsinkarachi.com/]Call girls in karachi[/url]

    [url=https://www-callgirlsinkarachi.com/]Escorts in karachi[/url]

    [url=https://www-callgirlsinkarachi.com/]Escorts service in karachi[/url]

    [url=https://www-callgirlsinkarachi.com/]Karachi escorts[/url]

    [url=https://www-callgirlsinkarachi.com/]Karachi call girls[/url]

    ReplyDelete
  24. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (German: Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari) is a 1920 German silent horror film, directed by Robert Wiene and written by Hans Janowitz and Carl Mayer. Considered the quintessential work of German Expressionist cinema, it tells the story of an insane hypnotist (Werner Krauss) who uses a somnambulist (Conrad Veidt) to commit murders. The film features a dark and striking visual style, with sharp-pointed forms, oblique and curving lines, structures and landscapes that lean and twist in unusual angles, and shadows and streaks of light painted directly onto the sets
    What Is Twitter And It’s Usage

    ReplyDelete
  25. Thanks for a marvelous posting! I definitely enjoyed reading it, you could be a great author.I will remember to bookmark your blog and may come back from now on. I want to encourage continue your great writing, have a nice Day!
    login hotmail

    ReplyDelete
  26. Get Packers and Movers Kolkata List of Top Reliable, 100% Affordable, Verified and Secured Service Provider. Get Free ###Packers and Movers Kolkata Price Quotation instantly and Save Cost and Time. ✔✔✔Packers and Movers Kolkata Reviews and Compare Charges for household Shifting, Home/Office Relocation, ***Car Transportation, Pet Relocation, Bike SHifting @ Packers and Movers Kolkata

    ReplyDelete
  27. free brazzers clip https://bit.ly/3eLxtsz

    ReplyDelete
  28. Special thanks to (hackingsetting50@gmail.com) for exposing my cheating husband. Right with me i got a lot of evidences and proofs that shows that my husband is a fuck boy and as well a cheater ranging from his text messages, call logs, WhatsApp messages, deleted messages and many more, All thanks to


    (hackingsetting50@gmail.com), if not for him i will never know what has been doing on for a long time


    ReplyDelete

  29. Special thanks to (hackingsetting50@gmail.com) for exposing my cheating husband. Right with me i got a lot of evidences and proofs that shows that my husband is a fuck boy and as well a cheater ranging from his text messages, call logs, whats-app messages, deleted messages and many more, All thanks to

    (hackingsetting50@gmail.com), if not for him i will never know what has been going on for a long time.

    Contact him now and thank me later.


    ReplyDelete
  30. I love reading this types of books. Thanks for sharing.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Where to download game killer apk sir? I have used COC Mod APK and Gbwhatsapp before but never used something lik this.

    ReplyDelete
  32. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  33. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  34. Attractive section of content. I just stumbled upon your website and in accession capital to assert that I get actually enjoyed account your posts. Anyway I'll be subscribing to your feeds and even I achievement you access consistently rapidly. GBWhatsapp Apk 2022

    ReplyDelete
  35. Users might have the option to introduce QuickBooks Desktop 2022 for PCs running 64-bit Windows. To affirm the effective introduce of 64-bit, dispatch QuickBooks Desktop

    QuickBooks tool hub
    QuickBooks Desktop premier 2021

    ReplyDelete
  36. Once Francis begins his tale, however, the film shifts into a phantasmagorical fantasyland, as characters go through their paces in an Expressionistic universe of distorted perspectives, asymmetrical doorways, crooked windows, sloping chimneys -- and streaks of light and shadow painted across tilted walls. Officious bureaucrats sit atop enormously high stools, frowning down upon fawning supplicants. Sleepwalkers stagger across impossibly slanting rooftops, and through forebodingly twisted forests.

    ReplyDelete