The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)

Directed by Robert Wiene

If I needed to describe it with two words, I'd use ‘weird’ and ‘confusing’. I liked the theatrical feel of it. I found those high chairs that police officers used quite funny and comical. How they crouched while writing. Makeup was great and reminded me of vampires. (So great Halloween inspiration) I noticed that most of the actors had dark hair… and I wonder if this would have been filmed during Hitler's time. Would most of the characters have blonde hair and blue eyes? Could Aryans be insane??

Decorations. Angular. Weird shapes. Interesting, but in some parts made me feel uncomfortable and a tad bit uneasy. It was an interesting movie. Not very scary. But to be fair, in the beginning of the film industry viewers were scared of the arrival of trains on the screen in ‘L'arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat’. And I would also assume that WWI was enough of a horror on its own. Where young men went from excited young men who were ready to fight for their nation to deeply broken and traumatised humans. So music, theatrical and decorative approach in set design was enough to set terror in people's minds.

About text. Type. Font. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari was a full visual experience. It's one of those movies where one cannot shift gaze from the screen to not to miss anything important on the screen. But the text. Font. Type itself had bad readability. Not dyslexia friendly. So some subtitles would have been great.

Plot. I found it confusing. If our lecturer hadn't explained a bit more after the screening. My first comment upon leaving the theatre, would have been ‘What just happened?’ I'm one of those people that like to have things as clear as possible. Communication is key! At least in everyday life and relationships. So for me the ending was open and up to interpretation. Was Mr. Francis insane or was the Director really the killer?

Considering everything that I could think of, my rating is 4 out of 5 angular windows.