Writing at home on my last night off. Tonight I did watch a movie : F.W. Murnau's Silent classic "Faust", from 1926. I had been wanting to see this movie for ages, simply because it was said to be one of the legendary examples of German Expressionism, and of all the genres of cinema that I have explored over the years, I've probably seen fewer films from the Expressionist genre than any other. Also, I hadn't seen any Murnau except for his vampire classic "Nosferatu", and I saw that probably 30 years ago, give or take. The Libe has never had a copy of "Faust", and in recent years the available dvds on Amazon were priced at the inflated rates that lead you to believe the film is out of print. But I've kept my eye on the situation from time to time, and just a couple weeks ago I found a copy of the Kino restoration print of "Faust"......for just ten bucks. It was from a Goodwill-type outlet, via Amazon, and I was very happy at my good fortune in scoring a copy for so cheap. As an additional bonus, the dvd was listed on Amazon as being in "acceptable" condition, which usually means "semi beat-up". But when it came in the mail I was again happy to see it was practically brand new.
So tonight I finally sat down to watch "Faust", starring the great but somewhat notorious Emil Jannings as Mephisto, aka The Devil, and an actor I had never heard of before - Gosta Ekman - as Faust. I am sure you know the story of Faust, who made a bargain with The Devil. It was written a couple hundred years ago by Goethe, which is pronounced "Goe-thh". You know.....Go as in "Green Light Go", and then - thh, like the "thhhh" sound, only with a couple less "h"s.
So, "Goe-thh" is the correct pronunciation of the author's name, though you will usually hear it pronounced "Gaer-ta" by folks who insist on attempting the German pronunciation instead of simply just saying it the way it looks , as I do. :)
Therefore, as long as we all agree on the correct pronunciation of "Goethe", we can proceed with the movie review.
There is a reason that the early genre of German Expressionism is so revered, and it is because of the look of these films, such as "The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari". German Expressionism often dealt with horror or fantasy subjects, and the directors would present them in a nightmarish way. In the Silent era, the theater of the stage was still the prime inspiration as a take-off point, and so the sets in these films look like stage sets, and the actors use big gestures and facial expressions as they would in a play. However, by 1926, movies had been around for over a decade, and the filmmakers and actors were beginning to get a little more adept at adjusting to the more subtle acting requirements of the close-at-hand movie camera. In addition, some of the best directors were experimenting with photographic techniques like double exposure, and also Gothic lighting for dramatic effect, and also the use of miniatures and models to simulate Monumental Happenings, like say, the burning of a town or some such.
I had always read that FW Murnau was a cinematic genius but I'd never had the chance to really see it until tonight. "Faust" has some of the greatest imagery of the Silent era, and I would say in all of cinema. I think an important part of the inventions that came out of the Silent era was that movies were brand new, and so they thought "let's try this kind of lighting", and "hey, let's use this "fire effect" in this scene". "Let's double expose this", etc. They were experimenting, and they were breaking new ground all the time because nobody had made movies before.
And because the early directors and actors mostly came from a theater background - and this part is huge - they were already well-versed in the effective aspects of Stage Production, i.e dramatic makeup, costuming, charismatic physical acting, and simply Projecting To The Audience.
So what you had was these technicians, these cameramen and lighting guys, who wanted to try out all these brand new styles (adapted from the theater) and do them on film, but you also had these great stage actors and actresses who already knew how to Play To The Back Row, but were now learning the subtleties of nuanced facial expression that were required by the camera. And controlling everything was a Director With A Vision, who was exhilarated by being at the forefront of this new artistic medium, The Motion Picture.
And so they Went For it. And in the Silent Era, all of the creative artists from different countries went for it in their own way. Here in America you had the all-out, over the top spectacles of Buster Keaton, for instance. He shot much of his stuff outdoors, with massive stunts and physical special effects that involved buildings falling down or cattle stampedes through city streets.
The German style was different. Their Silent Movies evolved from phantasmagorical stage productions, many of which came from adaptations of great philosophical works, or from old German folklore and fables. The German Silent tradition came out of the theater, and theater lighting and staging, and because the effect was somewhat hallucinatory, so was the German Expressionist movement born.
I will leave the story of "Faust" to you tonight, as I have mentioned that you may already know it, and it is very late and I must get to sleep because I will be back at work in the morning. But I must say that I cannot recommend "Faust" highly enough, in every respect. To watch it is to see how cutting edge it was 90 years ago, and how high the bar was set by these early experimenters in film, and most of all how Theatrical it was, but captured on movie film to create an altogether different reality.
Elizabeth, if you are reading, I hope you had a great day. I saw two posts with some beautiful illustrations of faeries and flowers by artists from the late 19th/early 20th Centuries. These are again an example of phantasmagoria, and they give you, just like the Silent films, an idea of the closer connection that existed a century ago between the acceptance of fantasy in the real world without a barrier in between. As an example, what I mean is that, say, in England or Ireland of a few hundred years ago, the idea of Faeries was accepted out in the open by the common folk, as part of an alternate reality that existed perhaps in the shadows, or at night, or in the woods. In those days, everyone knew Faeries were real, in other words. And so they were depicted by artists as real, from the heart, and even from a Christian belief, as per the one female artist whose work was shown in one of the posts.
I found that very heartening, I must say, because real Christianity is full of magic and the other side of reality, and love and beauty as shown by the artist in her drawings of the faeries and flowers, and in her unstated suggestion of why there is a connection between them in the first place...... :)
Well, that's all I know for tonight. I saw that one of your band guys got to meet Buzz Aldrin, too.
Now that is downright awesome.
See you in the morning. :):)
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