Clarity and depth are greatly improved, and the color tinting is bold and striking. The entire final segment, in which Jack relentlessly pursues the poet and the proprietor’s daughter, Eve (Olga Belajeff), comprises layers of double exposures that work to thoroughly unmoor our sense of cinematic time and space.įlicker Alley presents Waxworks in a new 2K restoration that’s simply stunning, a quantum-leap improvement over the Kino Lorber DVD from 2004. Ivan swaps roles and robes with the father of the bride, who’s then assassinated in his place. The Caliph has a wax dummy made to take his place when he sneaks out into the city at night. Within each story, there’s a similar doubling at work. And Jack’s looming bulk insinuates itself into the poet’s dreamlife. The automaton mechanism that animates Ivan the Terrible becomes the robotized nature of his madness. The Caliph’s broken-off arm morphs into a severed limb. Interestingly, aspects of the wax figures work their way into the stories themselves. (Not coincidentally, the latter two actors were the stars of The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari.) The resultant segments play out in a narratively lopsided manner, diminishing in duration as they intensify their emotional register. The proprietor (John Gottowt) hires him to write some lurid backstories for his exhibitions of Caliph Harun al-Rashid (Emil Jannings), Ivan the Terrible (Conrad Veidt), and Jack the Ripper (Werner Krauss). The frame story has a young poet (future director William Dieterle) arriving at a carnival, distinctly redolent of the one in The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari, in search of a job at the wax museum. But Leni and screenwriter Henrik Galeen manage these tonal shifts with total assurance, lending each segment its own particular and rewarding flavor. Generically speaking, Waxworks is a bit of of a hodgepodge, incorporating elements of ribald comedy, historical fantasy, and outright horror. Griffith with 1916’s Intolerance and-more importantly, given the uncanny subject matter-Richard Oswald’s Unheimliche Geschichten from 1919. Waxworks is also an early example of the anthology film pioneered by the likes of D.W. Its German title, Das Wachsfigurenkabinett, which translates to The Cabinet of Wax Figures, calls to mind Robert Wiene’s 1919 classic The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari, the quintessential work of the movement. Visit our MOD Acknowledgements for a complete list of contributors.Paul Leni’s Waxworks is often considered the swan song of German Expressionist cinema. Our Manufactured-On-Demand program has been made possible thanks to dozens of film fans whose generous contributions to our Indiegogo campaign helped to fund the launch of the program. Click on any of the titles below to complete your order of a custom-created, professionally packaged Blu-ray-R or DVD-R, which will be shipped directly to you.ĭepending on the publication, upon selecting a title for purchase, you may be redirected to a separate page hosted by MovieZyng, our MOD partner. Additionally, in an effort to explore a more economical approach to produce worthy and distinctive publications available to our valued customer base, we have launched a line of exclusive Flicker Alley MOD titles featuring replicated media. These can also be accessed below and will say “Manufactured On Pressed Media” next to the title. Enjoy unique, significant, and previously out-of-print classics from the Blackhawk Films® Collection with Manufactured-On-Demand (MOD) Blu-rays and DVDs.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |