German Expressionism

 Dominic Mayhall

German Expressionism

        Film without expression would be a pretty bland form of art. People like to see the reactions and gestures of other people, it's what makes us human. And like all things, film has evolved to show us different emotions through close ups. Which is what I think German Expressionism does well. 

        I watched two movies, the one you requested to watch, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and one of the suggestions, Nosferatu. I know of Nosferatu through pop culture, specifically a SpongeBob episode. On season 2, episode 16, they had an episode called "Graveyard Shift" and at the very end there's a shot of Count Orlok standing in the doorway flipping the light switch to scare them. I didn't know it was from a film the first time I watched it. Being a kid and all, I just thought they threw him in there to be scary. I find out a couple years later when I was rewatching the episode with my parents that they knew who Nosferatu was. I was surprised because I knew they knew movies, but not one from the silent movie era in the 1920s.

        When I was watching "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" I really appreciated Robert Wiene's use of the background and stage setting. The bizarre and wacky stage designs, plus the props used, made it feel like a totally different world then the majority of what you see in movies. I really loved the use of close ups in this movie especially. Even though the footage is gritty, you can clearly see people's features and reactions. I feel that even though there's no sound at all, the expressions the people make is what draws me in. At some parts of the movie the weirdness of it all was what kept me intrigued and watching. When you said that there were Tim Burton elements to it, I didn't think much of it. But I can see a lot of inspiration from both films I mentioned in his movies. 

        In Nosferatu, it has a different feel when watching it compared to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Which is obviously expected, because they are two different films after all. But in Nosferatu you get a bit of a lighter feel. I think this mostly because of the extremely exaggerated expressions they use in this film. It makes it seem a little less gloomy and even though it is still black and white with the doom and gloom feel. The lighting, or the way the light is in the movie, makes it feel not as intense. It is still an intense movie with eerie characters and backgrounds, but as a preference I preferred the feel of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.
        
        Nosferatu had great expressions, just a little too magnified for my taste. Like it seems they were play actors that haven't been in a movie or many movies before. And that was probably the case at this time in German movie history. The one thing about this movie that I thought was fantastic was its use of different settings and shots. All those different shots were visually appealing and gave you the exact notion of where those characters were. Both were wonderful movies with their own feel and designs. I think remakes of these two movies would actually do pretty well. Give these scripts modern actors and technology and I think they would reel in a good sum in the box office.
        

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