The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)

Power relations in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (Robert Wiene, 1920) are displayed through exaggeration. The mesmerist holds power over the somnambulist with the power of his eyes, with gestures, and with direct orders. Power is a central motif in the town depicted, with high officials showing their power by siting on high stools with huge ledgers before them, much as Caligari stands over the recumbent Cesare, or as Cesare stands over Jane and carries her off across the roofs of the town. Power relations in Metropolis are society-wide, with a clear division between those in power and those expected to serve those in power.

The force of German Expressionism is evident in the images that persist from films of the 1920s and 1930s first from Germany and then from Hollywood as more and more German directors and technicians fled Hitler's Germany and changed the way films were made in Hollywood. German Expressionism was an aesthetic that combined w

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nean city. Freder is much taken with Maria's beauty, but he is also astonished to learn of the life led by the workers. Fredersen seeks the help of the demented genius Rotwang, who knows the secrets of the lower world and who is willing to foment revolution to gain control himself. What follows is Freder's descent into the depths and his attempts to help the workers, who are rallied by the revolutionary Maria. Rotwang creates a robot, captures the real Maria, and transfers her face to the robot, and in this way he can make the workers, who are still following Maria, do whatever he wants. To this end, he is in the pay of Joh Fredersen, though here the film becomes muddied as Fredersen seems to be fomenting revolution himself, which is difficult to justify in terms of maintaining control as he so obviously wants. Both films use expressionistic sets, angular designs, and a certain other-worldly lighting to contribute to their sense of power and power relations. Power has been a central issue in the films of Fritz Lang both before and after Metropolis, and power is often delineated by Lang in near-mythical terms. This was certainly the case in the overtly mythical Destiny (1921) and the two-part Die Nibelungen (1922-192
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Approximate Word count = 2203
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page)