By Anton Kaes

Shell surprise Cinema explores how the classical German cinema of the Weimar Republic used to be haunted via the horrors of worldwide conflict I and the the devastating results of the nation's defeat. during this intriguing new booklet, Anton Kaes argues that masterworks comparable to The cupboard of Dr. Caligari, Nosferatu, The Nibelungen, and Metropolis, even supposing they don't depict conflict scenes or squaddies in wrestle, engaged the warfare and registered its tragic aftermath. those movies demonstrate a wounded country in post-traumatic surprise, reeling from a devastating defeat that it by no means formally said, not to mention accepted.

Kaes makes use of the time period "shell shock"--coined in the course of international warfare I to explain infantrymen struggling with anxious breakdowns--as a metaphor for the mental wounds that chanced on expression in Weimar cinema. administrators like Robert Wiene, F. W. Murnau, and Fritz Lang portrayed paranoia, panic, and worry of invasion in motion pictures peopled with serial killers, mad scientists, and afflicted younger males. Combining unique shut textual research with vast archival learn, Kaes indicates how this post-traumatic cinema of shell surprise reworked severe mental states into visible expression; the way it driven the boundaries of cinematic illustration with its fragmented tale traces, distorted views, and stark lights; and the way it helped create a modernist movie language that expected movie noir and continues to be exceptionally influential today.

A compelling contribution to the cultural background of trauma, Shell surprise Cinema exposes how German movie gave expression to the loss and acute grief that lay in the back of Weimar's glossy façade.

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Extra info for Shell shock cinema : Weimar culture and the wounds of war

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It is significant that the government wanted to hide its leading role in this venture from the public, so that Ufa’s films would not appear to be mere propaganda. From the beginning, in fact, Ufa’s mandate had been to improve the quality of films while still serving the interests of the armed forces and big business. ”46 After the war, the German government’s secret involvement in Ufa was exposed and publicly condemned in the National Assembly. Even though the state had to sell its holdings in the company, the consolidation of the German film industry had produced an unprecedented pool of artistic talent in every department, spanning screenwriting, acting, set and costume design, as well as directing.

He even rails against revolutionary idealism: “Hahaha. My flesh should rot in the gutter so that your idea can be victorious? ”47 Movie houses overflowed after the war, as did theaters and dance salons. At the movies the masses found safe entertainment, an alternative to the turmoil of the streets, that nevertheless frequently alluded to relevant moral dilemmas or high-risk scenarios. Domestic melodramas expressed the mood of the home front, while adventure serials echoed the treacherous experience of combat.

The simulation brought the war home and, like the documentaries, involved civilians in an adventure by proxy. For the first wartime Christmas season, German cinema produced a number of films about the war as it was imagined and experienced on the home front. Films with self-explanatory titles like German Women, German Loyalty; It Should Be the Entire Germany: On the Field of Honor; and The Fatherland Calls opened in the late fall of 1914. They told melodramatic stories of crisis in which the war provided the populace with a unique opportunity to prove themselves true German patriots, caring parents or sons, and loyal lovers or friends.

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