Series: Masterworks of Expressionist Cinema

In conjunction with the exhibition of the same name, LACMA will screen four iconic films that exemplify the heightened stylization of German Expressionist cinema, all of which feature astounding and expansive landscapes created in sound stages. Bookended by the two features highlighted in the exhibition—Robert Wiene’s landmark The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, the outlandish, cockeyed sets of which still astound, and Fritz Lang’s visionary science-fiction epic Metropolis, which pushed production design to new, monolithic heights of intricacy and scale—the series will also offer two lesser-known masterpieces. Paul Leni’s Waxworks was made in the wake of Caligari and tries to outdo its predecessor’s nightmarish artificiality. A director whose Hollywood career was shorter-lived, F.W. Murnau finished his run of German films on a high note with a seminal adaptation of the Faust legend that transposes the battle between god and the devil into an elemental struggle of light versus darkness, accented by virtuoso mise-en-scene.

Programmed by Bernardo Rondeau, Assistant Curator, Film Programs.

This series is presented with the support of the Goethe-Institut, Los Angeles.

Special support provided by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.