The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
Streaming|Goethe on Demand – Genre Cinema from Germany
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Online Online
- Language German with English and Spanish subtitles
- Price Free of charge, registration in Goethe on Demand portal is required
- Part of series: GENRE CINEMA FROM GERMANY
Horror // 1920 // Robert Wiene // 77 minutes
With the help of a sleepwalker, the diabolical Dr. Caligari terrorises a small town in northern Germany. This expressionist silent film classic is a unique work of art and helped German film to flourish in the early 1920s.
In the garden of a psychiatric clinic, the patient Francis tells his story: at the fair of a small town in northern Germany, the ghostly-looking Dr. Caligari announces hypnosis performances with his spineless medium Cesare. Alan and Francis, both in love with the same girl, attend Caligari's performance. Caligari announces that his medium will answer questions about the future for the audience. When Alan wants to know how long he will live, he is given the answer, "Until dawn!" In fact, he is found dead the next day. His friend Francis immediately suspects Caligari...
The film is considered the pinnacle of expressionism in film history. “Films must be animated drawings” - that was Hermann Warm's slogan at the time, according to which he and his two colleagues Walter Röhrig and Walter Reimann scenically constructed the world of Dr. Caligari. Accordingly, the decorations of CALIGARI formed a variety of jagged, sharply pointed forms, strongly reminiscent of Gothic models." (Siegfried Kracauer in "From Caligari to Hitler"). The shots are characterised by a methodical distortion of perspectives, the world appears as if it has been tilted out of kilter, and the viewers' viewing habits experience a systematic irritation. Whereas up to now in film history the décor has never been more than a background and an illustrative setting, here the scenery takes on a new function and meaning. The decorations, not the actors' acting, convey the despair, the tragedy and the hopelessness.
Hardly any other work is likely to have had such an intense influence on the further development of German silent film; after CALIGARI, the already existing interest in fantastic subjects increased, and with it began an intensive turn towards psychopathology and demonic-dangerous criminal figures. Siegfried Kracauer included CALIGARI in the cinematic premonitions of Hitler's dictatorship.
With the help of a sleepwalker, the diabolical Dr. Caligari terrorises a small town in northern Germany. This expressionist silent film classic is a unique work of art and helped German film to flourish in the early 1920s.
In the garden of a psychiatric clinic, the patient Francis tells his story: at the fair of a small town in northern Germany, the ghostly-looking Dr. Caligari announces hypnosis performances with his spineless medium Cesare. Alan and Francis, both in love with the same girl, attend Caligari's performance. Caligari announces that his medium will answer questions about the future for the audience. When Alan wants to know how long he will live, he is given the answer, "Until dawn!" In fact, he is found dead the next day. His friend Francis immediately suspects Caligari...
The film is considered the pinnacle of expressionism in film history. “Films must be animated drawings” - that was Hermann Warm's slogan at the time, according to which he and his two colleagues Walter Röhrig and Walter Reimann scenically constructed the world of Dr. Caligari. Accordingly, the decorations of CALIGARI formed a variety of jagged, sharply pointed forms, strongly reminiscent of Gothic models." (Siegfried Kracauer in "From Caligari to Hitler"). The shots are characterised by a methodical distortion of perspectives, the world appears as if it has been tilted out of kilter, and the viewers' viewing habits experience a systematic irritation. Whereas up to now in film history the décor has never been more than a background and an illustrative setting, here the scenery takes on a new function and meaning. The decorations, not the actors' acting, convey the despair, the tragedy and the hopelessness.
Hardly any other work is likely to have had such an intense influence on the further development of German silent film; after CALIGARI, the already existing interest in fantastic subjects increased, and with it began an intensive turn towards psychopathology and demonic-dangerous criminal figures. Siegfried Kracauer included CALIGARI in the cinematic premonitions of Hitler's dictatorship.