Brought to you by Tim Burton's long-lost German Grandad...
My memory is a little fuzzy on some of the plot details, I watched this back in Media Studies at College along with Nosferatu which I will be reviewing soon and I remember being blown away by the sets and backgrounds to this German Expressionism film.
I was reminded again recently when I watched the 2014 Australian horror film, The Babadook of Dr Caligari, as the design of The Babadook seemed to come from the same 'universe' and definitely took inspiration from this German Expressionism style. I also notice in a lot of music videos, in particular the band My Chemical Romance, this style is used which certainly speaks to its relevance and influence.
The idea of the carnivalesque, of traveling freak shows, body horror and mind control were certainly all prevelent in early 20s & 30s horror pictures and when you consider the context of the First World War, there is probably a clear and direct correlation.
BEST SCENE: Caligari reveals his somnambulist, Cesare to the world, in a wooden casket, we get an extreme closeup of Cesare's face and his eyes open suddenly. A trope that would become widely used as a good jump scare in the horror genre.
BEST CHARACTER: Francis - our lead character is quite reminiscent of Leonardo DiCaprio's in a film made 90 years later called Shutter Island.
BEST QUOTE: N/A
RATING: ★★★★ - this is a good film, it has a clear style, an engaging story and some genuinely unsettling moments, effective even now almost a century later.
MOVIES WATCHED:4
MOVIES REMAINING: 997
If you have not watched this movie lately it is certainly worth a revisit. The film museum in Berlin has an entire room dedicated to this film.
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