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5 August
Berlin: Symphony of a Great City (Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Groβtadt) (Dir. Walter Ruttman, Ger, 1927) (Screening format – DCP, 65mins) This is a visual symphony in five movements celebrating the Berlin of 1927: the people, the place, the everyday details of life on the streets. Director Walter Ruttman, an experimental filmmaker, approached cinema in similar ways to his Russian contemporary Dziga Vertoz, mixing documentary, abstract, and expressionist modes for a nonnarrative style that captured the life of his countrymen. But where Vertov mixed his observations with examples of the communist dream in action, Ruttman re-creates documentary as, in his own words, “a melody of pictures.” Within the loose structure of a day in the life of the city (with a prologue that travels from the country into the city on a barreling train), the film takes us from dawn to dusk, observing the silent city as it awakens with a bustle of activity, then the action builds and calms until the city settles back into sleep. But the city is as much the architecture, the streets, and the machinery of industry as it is people, and Ruttman weaves all these elements together to create a portrait in montage, the poetic document of a great European city captured in action. Held together by rhythm, movement, and theme, Ruttman creates a documentary that is both involving and beautiful to behold. Find out more at sensesofcinema.com . Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. With recorded music soundtrack. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
6 August
The Adventures of Prince Achmed (Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed) (Dir. Carl Koch and Lotte Reiniger, Ger, 1926) (Screening format – 35mm, 72 mins) Based on the classic collection of stories “Arabian Nights,” the film tells the story of an evil African sorcerer who tricks a young prince named Achmed into riding a wild magical flying horse which he does not know how to control. The evil sorcerer assumes that the Prince will eventually get thrown from the flying horse and plunge to his death. However, Prince Achmed manages to tame the flying horse and instead gets whisked away into a series of adventures that include encounters with Aladdin, the Witch of the Fiery Mountains, the beautiful Princess Pari Banu and of course a showdown with the evil African sorcerer. This German animated fairy-tale film is the oldest surviving animated feature film. It features a silhouette animation technique co-director Reiniger had invented which involved manipulated cutouts made from cardboard and thin sheets of lead under a camera. The technique she used for the camera is similar to Wayang shadow puppets, though her’s were animated frame by frame, not manipulated in live action. Find out more at moviessilently.com . Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. With live musical accompaniment. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
8 August
The Golem: How He Came Into The World (Dir. Carl Boese/Paul Wegener, Ger, 1920) (Screening Format – 35mm, 94mins) The only one of three films directed by and starring Paul Wegener concerning the Golem, a figure from Jewish folklore, to have survived, this is, along with The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari (Robert Wiene, 1920), one of the key works of Expressionism, as well as being one of the earliest and most influential horror films. In medieval Prague, Rabbi Loew fears disaster for the Jewish community at the hands of the Christian Emperor. To defend his people, he creates from clay the Golem, whose awakening leads to a series of disasters in this visual feast. Find out more at filmmonthly.com . Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. With live musical accompaniment from pianist Hilary Woods. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
12 August
Woman In The Moon ( Frau im Mond ) (Dir. Fritz Lang, Ger, 1929) (Screening format – Blu-Ray, 169mis) The first feature-length film to portray space-exploration in a serious manner, paying close attention to the science involved in launching a vessel from the surface of the earth to the valleys of the moon. In this, Lang’s final silent epic, the legendary filmmaker spins a tale involving a wicked cartel of spies who co-opt an experimental mission to the moon in the hope of plundering the satellite’s vast (and highly theoretical) stores of gold. When the crew, helmed by Willy Fritsch and Gerda Maurus (both of whom had previously starred in Lang’s Spione), finally reach their impossible destination, they find themselves stranded in a lunar labyrinth without walls — where emotions run scattershot, and the new goal becomes survival. A modern Daedalus tale which uncannily foretold Germany’s wartime push into rocket-science, Frau im Mond is as much a warning-sign against human hubris as it is a hopeful depiction of mankind’s potential. Find out more at sensesofcinema.com . Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. With recorded soundtrack. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
13 August
Variety (Dir. E A Dupont, Ger, 1925) (Screening format – Blu-Ray, 94mins) Actor Emil Jannings was one of the most esteemed actors of this time, working with directors such as F.W. Murnau and Josef von Sternberg, before moving to America to become the first winner of the Oscar for Best Actor, and ending his career in disgrace after appearing in Nazi propaganda films. In this seamy melodrama, he plays Boss Huller, a former trapeze artist who abandons his family for a younger colleague (Lya De Putti). When the couple becomes a professional trio, a love triangle is formed, and tragedy ensues. The film features some of the most inventive camerawork of the period, its ‘unchained’ approach making for breathtaking performance scenes.Find out more at moviessilently.com . Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. With recorded soundtrack. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
15 August
Waxworks (Dir. Paul Leni/Leo Birinisky, Ger, 1924) (Screening format – 16mm, 84mins) A wax museum owner employs a poet (William Dieterle) to create stories for his pieces. The poet dutifully pens disturbing tales, envisioning himself as a significant character in each story — a baker sentenced to death by the Caliph of Baghdad (Emil Jannings), a Russian prince contending with the deadly paranoia of Ivan the Terrible (Conrad Veidt) and a man who is pursued through the haunting streets of London by Jack the Ripper (Werner Krauss). Actor Conrad Veidt will forever hold a place in popular culture following his performance in The Man Who Laughs (1928), which inspired the appearance of Batman’s nemesis, the Joker. However, he had a significant career during the Weimar era, appearing as the murderous somnambulist in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and the similarly fantastic Unheimliche Geschichten (Richard Oswald, 1919) and The Hands of Orlac (Robert Wiene, 1924). Find out more at filmdirtblog.blogspot.co.uk . Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. With recorded soundtrack. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
19 August
Faust (Dir. F W Murnau, Ger, 1926) (Screening format – Blu-Ray, 107mins) Like Fritz Lang, F.W. Murnau is a towering figure of Weimar cinema, thanks to films such as Nosferatu (1922), The Last Laugh (1924), and, after moving to America, Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927). Murnau’s approach to framing and his use of liberating camera movements suggested to subsequent filmmakers a new way of using the pictorial space. Faust, the director’s final German film, draws on sources including Marlowe and Goethe in service of the story of a man who makes a deal with the devil. At that time the most expensive film made in Germany, it remains a visual triumph. Find out more at rogerebert.com. Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. Introduced by Dr. Piotr Sadowski, lecturer in film, literature, and drama at Dublin Business School, and author of an upcoming book on Weimar cinema. With recorded soundtrack. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
20 August
The Mountain Lion (aka The Wild Cat) (Dir. Ernst Lubitsch, Ger, 1921) (Screening format – DCP, 86mins) Ernst Lubitsch is primarily remembered for the comedies he made in America, such as Ninotchka (1939), which was co-written by fellow émigré Billy Wilder, and The Shop Around the Corner (1940). While still working in Germany, he alternated between large-scale historical epics such as Madame Du Barry (1919) and Anna Boleyn (1920), and lighter fare such as this, reportedly his own favourite of his German films. It stars frequent collaborator Pola Negri as a bandit leader who falls in love with the new lieutenant of a local fort. Thus the stage is set for anarchic, exuberant comedy, largely at the expense of the German military. Find out more at threemoviebuffs.com . Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. With recorded soundtrack. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
27 August
People on Sunday (Dir. Robert Siodmak/Edgar G Ulmer, Ger, 1929) (Screening format – DCP, 74mins) A novel blend of feature and documentary, People On Sunday was the result of a collaborative effort on the part of a number of talented individuals who would go on to significant careers in America as part of the exodus of talent precipitated by the Nazis coming to power, including its directors, Robert Siodmak and Edgar G. Ulmer, its writers, Billy Wilder and Curt Siodmak, and Fred Zinnemann, who worked on the camera crew. Following ordinary Berliners, including a taxi driver and a shop girl, as they go about their weekend recreation, the film would prove influential on both Italian Neo-Realism and the French New Wave. Find out more at archive.org. Presented as part of the series Dark Cormers: Cinema of the Weimar Republic. With recorded soundtrack. Irish Film Institute, Dublin Link
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