FST-3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: Silent Film
Document Summary
Expressionist films turn the everyday world inside out. Anti-realistic formal elements (set design, costume, lighting, acting) are. Silent cinema = designated international language, visual communication form. International language less, borderless communication intended to depict inner reality. The cabinet of dr. caligari (weine, 1920) Flashback to his story in and of itself at this time. Flashback world is nightmarishly crooked and narrow. World looks warped doesn"t look realistic anymore. As the movie ends, he continues to be in this delusional world, but we return to naturalistic, realistic film. By the end we don"t know if it was all made up, completely imagined. Twist at the end shutter island effect. Film that spawned a whole trend german expressionist style was coherent because it was so successful inside and outside of germany. The success of this film led to the german expressionist movement.
