The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari- Film Review
The silent film 'The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari' Is an interesting look into the perceived descent into madness. It uses a unique mix of costuming, set painting and design to portray that something isn't completely right, making a feel of disconnection to the watching audience.
The film has clearly inspired filmmakers as a lot of new horror tropes at the time were in this film have spanned out to other films, watching the film you realise where Tim Burton may get a lot of his inspiration for a lot of his films and stories as well as other things with his twist endings which is most prevalent in the stop motion film Coraline as Pheleim O'Neil argues on his article about the film 'the theatrical, expressionistic imagery is a perfect fit and has inspired generations of film-makers to take a less literal approach, and to exploit the visual potential of cinema'(1) as many films these days often do, though some do it better than others. Christopher Sharrett also writes how 'The entrance of Cesare/Conrad Veidt into the bedroom of Jane/Lil Dagover is a scene that finds its way into Universal's Dracula and Frankenstein' (2) which is very true, this film helped give birth to the trope of a monster getting out of a box or a vulnerable state, slowly and shakily still managing to give off a creepy and supernatural aura about said character.
The imagery within the film is very clever and subtle at times, some themes that are associated or secretly associated with characters surrounds them in scenes and scenery heavily involved with them for example, the bacteria on the walls when Caligari is thrown into the asylum cell, which make sense on a second viewing once you know he is actually a doctor for the asylum. This is reflected in media of more modern eras for example the Sixth sense, a film which drops subtle hints and tells you information that helps you fill in the blanks yourself but should you not be analysing the film and just accepting the story being told, you do not find the truth until the very end, despite the fact clues have been in your face the entire film. I personally will stay vague about the ending of the sixth sense as it is one i do not want to spoil for anyone as it ruins the entire watching experience.
An example of this subtle hinting towards the insanity of the protagonist is shown through the architecture, it subtly hints at his subconscious structure and how he thinks in his reality, outside is warped all outside architecture slides and slants, there are few straight edges, warped perspective, odd colours and areas that wind and twist. This is a portrayal of how unfamiliar the protagonist is with the outside. Inside the asylum that he is most familiar with a new reality is weaved with circus imagery as it is heavily linked with his association of his doctor with the character, Doctor Caligari.
Costume is a key part due to the inability to use a lot of dialogue to tell stories a lot of visual shortcuts are made to help the technical limitations of silent film at the time, doctors were in lab-coats and quite interestingly class is shown via the hats worn by the characters, caps for the working class conical hats for the middle class and high cylindrical top hats for the upper class. This can be linked back to Germany, the films country of origin, as in 1920 people were very much classed by what they did and how much money they made as well as the jobs they did. It also shows a very typical portrayal of women at the time, portraying the only key female character as an ethereal being clad in white wispy clothing signifying innocence, romanticism and beauty. She is treated as an object, and though this has in recent times become less prevalent there is still some examples of this in modern film and cinema, often in children's films surprisingly enough.
The film could also be argued to reflect the political situation at the time as in 1920 it had only been two years since the first world war had ended and the Treaty of Versailles was signed burdening Germany with debt and not being terribly popular amoung Germany's people for that reason. Democracy was in turmoil and many things felt very unstable and crazy. Perhaps the chaos and confusion portrayed within the film could be an attempt to address that, at this time entertainment and film was a way to distract people from the problems, it was part of the reason for its creation, to keep moral up during wartime and that would continue on to stay as a propaganda machine in the time of world war two.
Julia A. Walker of the 'Theatre Journal' argues that the film 'engages a Freudian model of the self...'(3) which is a theory which in simplest terms theorises that the human mind works with three different sets of mind in simplest terms being Id, in this theory meaning instincts, Ego, being reality, and finally Superego, being morality. Sometimes being shown as the idea of a devil and angel on the shoulder of somebody with a difficult decision to make. In part I do agree with Julia however i wouldn't say this kind of attitude and analysis of the psyche is shown through the scenery and not the characters themselves, most of the time we are shown everything through the eyes of the main protagonist of the film and that is broken at the end of the film where it is shown that our protagonist is insane, so one could argue that throughout the film we are looking at it through the lense of Id and Superego and how they can conflict as true reality being shown and is only shown at the end of the film where our perspective of our main protagonist is broken and thrown into complete question as he is thrown into the same cell that Caligari is thrown into only ten minutes prior. If anything, this film shows how everyone has their own personal Ego and each Ego is different in its views and its reality balanced out by Id and Superego in their own ratios depending on the person.
Overall, despite the fact that the narrative was simple and sometimes hard to follow, The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari is a film I enjoy due to its clever and functional stylistic differences to it's pre-existing cinematic films at the time its overall melodrama and its analysis of psychological theory.
The film has clearly inspired filmmakers as a lot of new horror tropes at the time were in this film have spanned out to other films, watching the film you realise where Tim Burton may get a lot of his inspiration for a lot of his films and stories as well as other things with his twist endings which is most prevalent in the stop motion film Coraline as Pheleim O'Neil argues on his article about the film 'the theatrical, expressionistic imagery is a perfect fit and has inspired generations of film-makers to take a less literal approach, and to exploit the visual potential of cinema'(1) as many films these days often do, though some do it better than others. Christopher Sharrett also writes how 'The entrance of Cesare/Conrad Veidt into the bedroom of Jane/Lil Dagover is a scene that finds its way into Universal's Dracula and Frankenstein' (2) which is very true, this film helped give birth to the trope of a monster getting out of a box or a vulnerable state, slowly and shakily still managing to give off a creepy and supernatural aura about said character.
The imagery within the film is very clever and subtle at times, some themes that are associated or secretly associated with characters surrounds them in scenes and scenery heavily involved with them for example, the bacteria on the walls when Caligari is thrown into the asylum cell, which make sense on a second viewing once you know he is actually a doctor for the asylum. This is reflected in media of more modern eras for example the Sixth sense, a film which drops subtle hints and tells you information that helps you fill in the blanks yourself but should you not be analysing the film and just accepting the story being told, you do not find the truth until the very end, despite the fact clues have been in your face the entire film. I personally will stay vague about the ending of the sixth sense as it is one i do not want to spoil for anyone as it ruins the entire watching experience.
An example of this subtle hinting towards the insanity of the protagonist is shown through the architecture, it subtly hints at his subconscious structure and how he thinks in his reality, outside is warped all outside architecture slides and slants, there are few straight edges, warped perspective, odd colours and areas that wind and twist. This is a portrayal of how unfamiliar the protagonist is with the outside. Inside the asylum that he is most familiar with a new reality is weaved with circus imagery as it is heavily linked with his association of his doctor with the character, Doctor Caligari.
Costume is a key part due to the inability to use a lot of dialogue to tell stories a lot of visual shortcuts are made to help the technical limitations of silent film at the time, doctors were in lab-coats and quite interestingly class is shown via the hats worn by the characters, caps for the working class conical hats for the middle class and high cylindrical top hats for the upper class. This can be linked back to Germany, the films country of origin, as in 1920 people were very much classed by what they did and how much money they made as well as the jobs they did. It also shows a very typical portrayal of women at the time, portraying the only key female character as an ethereal being clad in white wispy clothing signifying innocence, romanticism and beauty. She is treated as an object, and though this has in recent times become less prevalent there is still some examples of this in modern film and cinema, often in children's films surprisingly enough.
The film could also be argued to reflect the political situation at the time as in 1920 it had only been two years since the first world war had ended and the Treaty of Versailles was signed burdening Germany with debt and not being terribly popular amoung Germany's people for that reason. Democracy was in turmoil and many things felt very unstable and crazy. Perhaps the chaos and confusion portrayed within the film could be an attempt to address that, at this time entertainment and film was a way to distract people from the problems, it was part of the reason for its creation, to keep moral up during wartime and that would continue on to stay as a propaganda machine in the time of world war two.
Julia A. Walker of the 'Theatre Journal' argues that the film 'engages a Freudian model of the self...'(3) which is a theory which in simplest terms theorises that the human mind works with three different sets of mind in simplest terms being Id, in this theory meaning instincts, Ego, being reality, and finally Superego, being morality. Sometimes being shown as the idea of a devil and angel on the shoulder of somebody with a difficult decision to make. In part I do agree with Julia however i wouldn't say this kind of attitude and analysis of the psyche is shown through the scenery and not the characters themselves, most of the time we are shown everything through the eyes of the main protagonist of the film and that is broken at the end of the film where it is shown that our protagonist is insane, so one could argue that throughout the film we are looking at it through the lense of Id and Superego and how they can conflict as true reality being shown and is only shown at the end of the film where our perspective of our main protagonist is broken and thrown into complete question as he is thrown into the same cell that Caligari is thrown into only ten minutes prior. If anything, this film shows how everyone has their own personal Ego and each Ego is different in its views and its reality balanced out by Id and Superego in their own ratios depending on the person.
Overall, despite the fact that the narrative was simple and sometimes hard to follow, The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari is a film I enjoy due to its clever and functional stylistic differences to it's pre-existing cinematic films at the time its overall melodrama and its analysis of psychological theory.
1.) O'Neill, P (2010) The Greatest Films of All Time: Volume seven: Horror: 16 The Cabinet of Dr Caligari Robert Wiene, 1920, Guardian Newspapers,7(16)
2.) Sharrett, C (2000) The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari and Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, Cineaste, 25(4)
3.) Walker, J.A (2006),'"In the Grip of an Obsession": Delsarte and the Quest for Self-Possession in 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari'' Theatre Journal, 58(4), pp. 617-631
2.) Sharrett, C (2000) The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari and Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, Cineaste, 25(4)
3.) Walker, J.A (2006),'"In the Grip of an Obsession": Delsarte and the Quest for Self-Possession in 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari'' Theatre Journal, 58(4), pp. 617-631
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