MISSION ACCOMPLISHED?

COMMANDER IN GRIEF

Bush Boosts Troops In Afghanistan
WASHINGTON, Feb. 15, 2007(CBS/AP) President Bush will extend the stay of 3,200

U.S. troops in Afghanistan by four months and will deploy a replacement force to

sustain that increase for the foreseeable future. The additional troops are

slated to help NATO troops confront a resurgent Taliban.

Describing a country on the brink, President Bush used his speech to exhort NATO

nations to send additional troops to Afghanistan and allow their soldiers

already there to fight in the violent south and under other dangerous

circumstances.

It is believed that Taliban and al Qaeda forces are planning a spring offensive

against the U.S.-backed government of president Hamid Karzai, CBS News White

House correspondent Mark Knoller reports.

A spokeswoman for the National Security Council at the White House tells Knoller

there are 27,407 U.S. troops in Afghanistan — that includes the extension of

3,200 that Mr. Bush spoke of today. Roughly 15,000 serve as part of the NATO-led

force and another 12,000 serve as special operations forces and trainers.

The president is asking Congress to provide $11.8 billion over the next two

years for operations, military and otherwise, in Afghanistan. And he is urging

other nations to follow the lead.

The imbalance in Afghanistan has become a sore point among allies.

"When our commanders on the ground say to our respective countries `We need

additional help,' our NATO countries must provide it," Mr. Bush said in a speech

at the American Enterprise Institute. "As well, allies must lift restrictions on

the forces they do provide so NATO commanders have the flexibility they need to

defeat the enemy wherever the enemy may make its stand."

The president said that listening to his request is not only an obligation

nations make as part of NATO, but is also crucial to their own security.

"The alliance was founded on this principle: an attack on one is an attack on

all. That principle holds true whether the attack is on the home soil of a NATO

nation or on allied forces deployed on a NATO mission abroad," he said. "By

standing together in Afghanistan, NATO forces protect their own people."

Mr. Bush said the importance of fighting in Afghanistan hinges on that the U.S.

needs to fight terror overseas so terrorists don't bring vengeance to U.S. soil

again, CBS News' Aleen Sirgany reports.

Troops from Canada, Britain, the Netherlands and the United States have been

doing most of the fighting and leaders of those countries have been lobbying the

other 22 allied countries to do more. Countries such as Germany, for instance,

don't allow their forces to deploy to the heart of the Taliban insurgency in the

south and east.

Fighting in Afghanistan the past year was the bloodiest since the U.S.-led war

started in 2001 and toppled the Taliban regime. Commanders anticipate a renewed

offensive this spring by Taliban fighters trying to stage a comeback and topple

the elected government in Kabul.

Several countries have offered recently to provide additional support to the

35,500-strong NATO force, but it remains to be seen whether coalition commanders

will get the troops, equipment and rules of engagement they say they need.

Mr. Bush said the need for others nations to step up is great as spring comes,

bringing an expected new offensive by the Taliban.

"The snow is going to melt in the Hindu Kush mountains and when it does we can

expect fierce fighting to continue," the president said. "The Taliban and al

Qaida are preparing to launch new attacks. Our strategy is not to be on the

defense but to go on the offense. This spring there's going to be a new

offensive in Afghanistan and it's going to be a NATO offensive. And that's part

of our strategy — relentless in our pressure. We will not give in."

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Tom Lantos, D-Calif., said on Capitol

Hill that allies in Europe and the Gulf must step up.

"It is simply unacceptable that NATO commanders are left to beg for troops from

countries like Germany, France, Italy, and Spain," he said. "It is an outrage

that only troops from the United States, Canada, the Netherlands, Denmark and

the United Kingdom are deployed to the most hazardous spots. ... No longer

should this administration stand passively by while our so-called allies take

advantage of American generosity and courage."

President Bush expressed concern about an increase in poppy production in

Afghanistan, saying Taliban forces use profits from selling the drug to buy

weapons to fight the government. "This is a direct threat to a free future for

Afghanistan," the president said.

Mr. Bush said he made his concerns clear to Afghan President Hamid Karzai. "He's

got to do something about it, with our help." The president also said the United

States would help Karzai fight corruption in Afghanistan's judicial system.

"Afghans too often see their courts run by crooked judges," President Bush said.

Bush said the border area of Afghanistan and Pakistan was "wilder than the wild

west" of America's pioneering days, and that the United States would work with

both countries to defeat terrorists.

"A lot of attention here in the United States is on Iraq," Mr. Bush said. "One

reason I've come to address you is I want to make sure people's attention also

is on Afghanistan."


© MMVII, CBS Interactive, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The Young British Soldier

When the 'arf-made recruity goes out to the East
'E acts like a babe an' 'e drinks like a beast,
An' 'e wonders because 'e is frequent deceased
Ere 'e's fit for to serve as a soldier.
Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
Serve, serve, serve as a soldier,
So-oldier ~OF~ the Queen!

Now all you recruities what's drafted to-day,
You shut up your rag-box an' 'ark to my lay,
An' I'll sing you a soldier as far as I may:
A soldier what's fit for a soldier.
Fit, fit, fit for a soldier . . .

First mind you steer clear o' the grog-sellers' huts,
For they sell you Fixed Bay'nets that rots out your guts --
Ay, drink that 'ud eat the live steel from your butts --
An' it's bad for the young British soldier.
Bad, bad, bad for the soldier . . .

When the cholera comes -- as it will past a doubt --
Keep out of the wet and don't go on the shout,
For the sickness gets in as the liquor dies out,
An' it crumples the young British soldier.
Crum-, crum-, crumples the soldier . . .

But the worst o' your foes is the sun over'ead:
You ~must~ wear your 'elmet for all that is said:
If 'e finds you uncovered 'e'll knock you down dead,
An' you'll die like a fool of a soldier.
Fool, fool, fool of a soldier . . .

If you're cast for fatigue by a sergeant unkind,
Don't grouse like a woman nor crack on nor blind;
Be handy and civil, and then you will find
That it's beer for the young British soldier.
Beer, beer, beer for the soldier . . .

Now, if you must marry, take care she is old --
A troop-sergeant's widow's the nicest I'm told,
For beauty won't help if your rations is cold,
Nor love ain't enough for a soldier.
'Nough, 'nough, 'nough for a soldier . . .

If the wife should go wrong with a comrade, be loath
To shoot when you catch 'em -- you'll swing, on my oath! --
Make 'im take 'er and keep 'er: that's Hell for them both,
An' you're shut o' the curse of a soldier.
Curse, curse, curse of a soldier . . .

When first under fire an' you're wishful to duck,
Don't look nor take 'eed at the man that is struck,
Be thankful you're livin', and trust to your luck
And march to your front like a soldier.
Front, front, front like a soldier . . .

When 'arf of your bullets fly wide in the ditch,
Don't call your Martini a cross-eyed old bitch;
She's human as you are -- you treat her as sich,
An' she'll fight for the young British soldier.
Fight, fight, fight for the soldier . . .

When shakin' their bustles like ladies so fine,
The guns o' the enemy wheel into line,
Shoot low at the limbers an' don't mind the shine,
For noise never startles the soldier.
Start-, start-, startles the soldier . . .

If your officer's dead and the sergeants look white,
Remember it's ruin to run from a fight:
So take open order, lie down, and sit tight,
And wait for supports like a soldier.
Wait, wait, wait like a soldier . . .

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
So-oldier ~of~ the Queen!

Rudyard Kipling

AN OLD SONG

Clinton Warns Bush On Attacking Iran
WASHINGTON, Feb. 14, 2007(AP) Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton warned President Bush on Wednesday not to take any military action against Iran without getting congressional approval first.

"If the administration believes that any, any use of force against Iran is necessary, the president must come to Congress to seek that authority," Clinton said in a Senate speech.

Clinton, a member of the Armed Services Committee, voted in 2002 to give Mr. Bush the authority to use military force in Iraq — a vote that has prompted some Democrats to demand that she repudiate.

Since then, the New York senator has become an outspoken critic of Mr. Bush's handling of the war. She said the new Democratic Congress must not let him make similar mistakes in the increasingly tense relationship with Iran.

"It would be a mistake of historical proportion if the administration thought that the 2002 resolution authorizing force against Iraq was a blank check for the use of force against Iran without further congressional authorization," Clinton said.

She also insisted the resolution authorizing force against those responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks did not allow for U.S. action now against Iran.

Clinton, who has come under fire from anti-war Democrats, excoriated the previous Republican-controlled Congress for not questioning the administration over the past six years.

"We continue to experience the consequences of unchecked presidential action," she said, later adding: "This president was allowed for too long to commit blunder after blunder under cover of darkness provided by an allied Republican Congress."

Clinton spoke shortly after President Bush said he was certain the Iranian government is supplying deadly weapons used by fighters in Iraq against U.S. troops, even if he can't prove that the orders came from top Iranian leaders.

"I'm going to do something about it," Mr. Bush pledged, displaying apparent irritation at being repeatedly asked about mixed administration signals on who was behind the weaponry.

U.S. officials have said that Iran is behind attacks against troops in Iraq, an assertion denied by Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.


© MMVII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

COFFEE BREAK BLUES W/DALI

Un chien andalou (1929)

In a dream-like sequence, a woman's eye is slit open--juxtaposed with a similarly shaped cloud obsucuring the moon moving in the same direction as the knife through the eye--to grab the audience's attention. The French phrase "ants in the palms," (which means that someone is "itching" to kill) is shown literally. A man pulls a piano along with the tablets of the Ten Commandments and a dead donkey towards the woman he's itching to kill. A shot of differently striped objects is repeatedly used to connect scenes.

Summary written by Ryan T. Casey {RTCasey@mn.uswest.net}

Un Chien Andalou consists of seventeen minutes of bizarre and surreal images that may or may not mean anything. A straight razor seems to be placed by a woman's eye, a small cloud formation obscures the moon, a cow's eye is slit open, a woman pokes at a severed hand in the street with his cane, a man drags two grand pianos containing dead and rotting donkeys and live priests, and a man's hand has a hole in the palm from which ants emerge.

Summary written by Michael Brooke {michael@everyman.demon.co.uk}

If I AM NOT FOR MYSELF....

Bush/Cheney Risk Israel's Survival

By Ray McGovern
February 12, 2007

Editor’s Note: The Bush administration presents itself as Israel's staunchest

friend, but some of its reckless policies are worsening Israel's security

situation. In this guest essay, former CIA analyst Ray McGovern asks whether

Israel might begin asking the age-old question, "with friends like these, who

needs enemies?"

President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are unwittingly playing

Dr. Jack Kevorkian in helping the state of Israel commit suicide.
Share this article


For this is the inevitable consequence of the planned air and missile attack on

Iran. The pockmarked, littered landscape in Iraq, Lebanon, and Afghanistan and

the endless applicant queues at al-Qaeda and other terrorist recruiting stations

testify eloquently to the unintended consequences of myopic policymakers in

Washington and Tel Aviv.

Mesmerized. Sadly, this is the best word to describe those of us awake to the

inexorable march of folly to war with Iran and the growing danger to Israel’s

security, especially over the medium and long term.

An American and/or Israeli attack on Iran will let slip the dogs of war. Those

dogs never went to obedience school. They will not be denied their chance to

bite, and Israel’s arsenal of nuclear weapons will be powerless to muzzle them.

In my view, not since 1948 has the very existence of Israel hung so much in the

balance. Can Bush/Cheney and the Israeli leaders not see it?

Pity that no one seems to have read our first President’s warning on the noxious

effects of entangling alliances. The supreme irony is that in their fervor to

help, as well as use, Israel, Bush and Cheney seem blissfully unaware that they

are leading it down a garden path and off a cliff.

Provoke and Pre-empt

Whether it is putting the kibosh on direct talks with Iran or between Israel and

Syria, the influence and motives of the Vice President are more transparent than

those of Bush.

Sure, Cheney told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer recently that the administration’s Iraq

policy would be “an enormous success story,” but do not believe those who

dismiss Cheney as “delusional.” He and his “neo-conservative” friends are crazy

like a fox. They have been pushing for confrontation with Iran for many years,

and saw the invasion of Iraq in that context.

Alluding to recent U.S. military moves, author Robert Dreyfuss rightly describes

the neo-cons as “crossing their fingers in the hope that Iran will respond

provocatively, making what is now a low-grade cold war inexorably heat up.”

But what about the President? How to explain his fixation with fixing Iran’s

wagon? Cheney’s influence over Bush has been shown to be considerable ever since

the one-man search committee for the 2000 vice presidential candidate picked

Cheney.

The Vice President can play Bush like a violin. But what strings is he using

here? Where is the resonance?

Experience has shown the President to be an impressionable sort with a roulette

penchant for putting great premium on initial impressions and latching onto

people believed to be kindred souls—be it Russian President Vladimir Putin

(trust at first sight), hale-fellow-well-met CIA director George Tenet, or

oozing-testosterone-from-every-pore former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

Of particular concern was his relationship with Sharon. Retired Gen. Brent

Scowcroft, a master of discretion with the media, saw fit to tell London’s

Financial Times two and a half years ago that Sharon had Bush “mesmerized” and

“wrapped around his little finger.”

As chair of the prestigious President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board

under George W. Bush and national security adviser to his father, Scowcroft was

uniquely positioned to know—and to draw comparisons. He was summarily fired

after making the comments about Sharon and is now persona non grata at the White

House.

Compassion Deficit Disorder

George W. Bush first met Sharon in 1998, when the Texas governor was taken on a

tour of the Middle East by Matthew Brooks, then executive director of the

Republican Jewish Coalition. Sharon was foreign minister and took Bush on a

helicopter tour over the Israeli occupied territories.

An Aug. 3, 2006 McClatchy wire story by Ron Hutcheson quotes Matthew Brooks: “If

there’s a starting point for George W. Bush’s attachment to Israel, it’s the day

in late 1998, when he stood on a hilltop where Jesus delivered the Sermon on the

Mount, and, with eyes brimming with tears, read aloud from his favorite hymn,

‘Amazing Grace.’ He was very emotional. It was a tear-filled experience. He

brought Israel back home with him in his heart. I think he came away profoundly

moved.”

Bush made gratuitous but revealing reference to that trip at the first meeting

of his National Security Council on Jan. 30, 2001. After announcing he would

abandon the decades-long role of honest broker between Israelis and Palestinians

and would tilt pronouncedly toward Israel, Bush said he would let Sharon resolve

the dispute however he saw fit.

At that point he brought up his trip to Israel with the Republican Jewish

Coalition and the flight over Palestinian camps, but there was no sense of

concern for the lot of the Palestinians. In A Pretext for War James Bamford

quotes Bush: “Looked real bad down there,” he said with a frown. Then he said it

was time to end America’s efforts in the region. “I don’t see much we can do

over there at this point,” he said.

So much for the Sermon on the Mount. The version I read puts a premium on

actively working for justice. There is no suggestion that tears suffice.

Then-Secretary of the Treasury Paul O’Neill, who was at the NSC meeting,

reported that Colin Powell, the newly minted but nominal secretary of state, was

taken completely by surprise at this nonchalant jettisoning of longstanding

policy. Powell demurred, warning that this would unleash Sharon and “the

consequences could be dire, especially for the Palestinians.”

But according to O’Neill, Bush just shrugged, saying, “Sometimes a show of

strength by one side can really clarify things.” O’Neill says that Powell seemed

“startled.” It is a safe bet that the Vice President was in no way startled.

A similar account reflecting Bush’s compassion deficit disorder leaps from the

pages of Ron Suskind’s The One Percent Doctrine. Crown Prince Abdullah, Saudi

Arabia’s de facto leader was in high dudgeon in April 2002 when he arrived in

Crawford to take issue with Bush’s decision to tilt toward Israel and jettison

the long-standing American role of honest broker in the Israeli-Palestinian

conflict.

With Bush’s freshly bestowed “man-of-peace” epithet for Sharon still ringing in

Abdullah’s ear, he began by insisting that before a word was spoken the

President and his aides watch a 15-minute video the prince had brought of mayhem

on the West Bank, of American-made tanks, bloodied and dead children, screaming

mothers.

Then, still wordless, they all filed into another room where the Saudis

proceeded to make specific demands, but Bush appeared distracted and was non-

responsive. After a few minutes, the President turned to Abdullah and said,

“Let’s go for a drive. Just you and me. I’ll show you the ranch.”

Bush was so obviously unprepared to discuss substance with his Saudi guests that

some of the President’s aides checked into what had happened. The briefing

packet for the President had been diverted to Cheney’s office. Bush never got

it, so he was totally unaware of what the Saudis hoped to accomplish in making

the hajj to Crawford.

(There is little doubt that this has been a common experience over the past six

years and that there are, in effect, two “deciders” in the White House, one of

them controlling the paper flow.)

Not that Bush was starved for background briefings. Indeed, he showed a

preference to get them from Prime Minister Sharon who, with his senior military

aide, Gen. Yoav Galant, briefed the President both in Crawford (in 2005) and the

Oval Office (in 2003) on Iran’s “nuclear weapons program.”

Sorry if I find that odd. That used to be our job at CIA. I’ll bet Sharon and

Galant packed a bigger punch.

There is, no doubt, more at play here regarding Bush’s attitude and behavior

regarding Israel and Palestine. One need not be a psychologist to see ample

evidence of oedipal tendencies. It is no secret that the President has been

privately critical of what he perceives to be his father’s mistakes.

Suskind notes, for example, that Bush defended his tilt toward Israel by telling

an old foreign policy hand, “I’m not going to be supportive of my father and all

his Arab buddies!”

And it seems certain that Ariel Sharon gave the young Bush an earful about the

efforts of James Baker, his father’s secretary of state, to do the unthinkable;

i.e., crank Arab grievances into deals he tried to broker between Israel and the

Palestinians. It seems clear that this is one reason the Baker-Hamilton report

was dead on arrival.

Dangerous Friends

George W. Bush may have the best of intentions in his zeal to defend Israel, but

he and Cheney have the most myopic of policies.

Israeli leaders risk much if they take reassurance from the President’s

rhetoric, particularly vis-à-vis Iran. I am constantly amazed to find, as I

speak around the country, that the vast majority of educated Americans believe

we have a defense treaty with Israel. We don’t, but one can readily see how it

is they are misled. Listen to the President exactly two years ago:

“Clearly, if I was the leader of Israel and I’d listened to some of the

statements by the Iranian ayatollahs that regarded the security of my country,

I’d be concerned about Iran having a nuclear weapon as well. And, in that Israel

is our ally—and in that we’ve made a very strong commitment to support Israel—we

will support Israel if her security is threatened.”

We do no favors for Israeli leaders in giving them the impression they have

carte blanche in their neighborhood—and especially vis-à-vis Iran, and that we

will bail them out, no matter what.

Have they learned nothing from the recent past? Far from enhancing Israel’s

security, the U.S. invasion of Iraq and Washington’s encouragement of Israel’s

feckless attack on Lebanon last summer resulted in more breeding ground for

terrorist activity against Israel.

This will seem child’s play compared to what would be in store, should the U.S.

and/or Israel bomb Iran.

Bottom line: there is a growing threat to Israel from suicide bombers. The most

dangerous two work in the White House.

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical

Church of the Saviour in Washington, DC. He was a CIA analyst for 27 years and

is on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity

(VIPS). His e-mail is rrmcgovern@aol.com. (The original version of this article

appeared on TomPaine.com.)

the cabnet of dr. caligari

SEE IMMEDIATE PREVIOUS POST - HENRY_ALLEN

THE STUFF OF NIGHTMARES

Alraune, 1928

Alrane was Brigette Helm’s first film after her astounding debut in Metropolis. Her character and the film’s expressionist style are rendered perfectly by Hans Neuman for this 2-sheet poster design.

Year: 1928

Production: Ama Film

Director: Henrik Galeen

Starring: Brigitte Helm, Paul Wegener, Ivan Petrovich

Screenwriter: Henrik Galeen

Based on Alraune (1911) by Hanns Heinz Ewers

125 minutes; B/W

---

A professor of genetics (Wegener) conducts a cold-blooded experiment into the Nature-versus-nurture controversy. Using the semen of a hanged man to fertilize a whore, he creates life - a girl baby called Alraune - by artificial insemination in the laboratory. After this scientificional beginning, Alraune becomes like Frankenstein (1818) by Mary Shelley, a fantastic Gothic melodrama of retribution for a crime against Nature; nevertheless, in its distrust of the scientist, Alraune is wholly central to the development of sf. Alraune (Helm), who is named after and compared throughout with the mythic mandrake root that grows where a hanged man's seed falls, appears to have no soul, and when, as a young woman, she learns of her dark origins, she revenges herself against her "father", the professor - although at the end there is hope she will be heartless no longer. Usually spoken of as a great classic of the German silent cinema, Alraune is actually more of an early exploitation movie, stylish but prurient, with more than a whiff of incest in the theme. Helm's eroticism, which we are to deplore, was in fact the reason for the film's commercial success. However, Galeen considerably softened the portrait of Alraune rendered in Ewer's sensationalist novel: whereas in the book she is a monster of depravity, causing illness and suicide wherever she goes, in the film she merely causes mayhem and a little pain. This is generally agreed to be the best of the five film versions of the 1911 book, the others being from 1918 (twice - Germany and Hungary - the latter being directed by Mihaly Kertesz, who became Michael Curtiz, the director of Casablanca [1942]), 1930 (Germany, again starring Helm) and 1952 (Germany, starring Hildegard Knef and Erich von Stroheim).

The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction

SURREAL HORROR

Good horror genre is the stuff of nightmares are made of. No film has ever reproduced the subjective feeling of nightmares - but some, notably the classics of German expressionism, sometimes comes pretty damn close! Henry_Allen

German Expressionist Cinema 1919 - 1933

Introduction:

In this essay I intend to discuss the German expressionism cinema movement from 1919- 1933. First I look at the meaning of expressionism in general and in terms of film. Then I show the expressionist cinema in a historian context and how it could become the only national cinema comparable to America's at this time. I have a closer look at The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, the film that "first brought expressionism to the German cinema." Finally I examine why the expressionist movement "died out around 1924" but influenced later films such as Metropolis, M and Kameradschaft.

First of all I would like to look at the meaning of "expressionism". Expressionism has it roots in "painting (starting about 1910) and had been quickly taken up in theatre, then in literature, and in architecture." "Flashback, A Brief History Of Film" quotes that "expressionism emphasized a given artist's emotional, intensely personal reactions; it was thus in contrast to the traditional view that an artist should strive faithfully to reproduce the natural appearance of the object or person being painted, sculpted, or written about." All different definitions of "Expressionism" acquaint it as a theory of art that expresses feelings in an abstract way.

The German Expressionist cinema from 1919 to 1933 was a new movie style that revealed a few widely regarded films. As adapted for film Pam Cook describes expressionism in her Cinema Book as an "extreme stylisation of mise en scene... " and "The stylistic features of German Expressionism are fairly specific and include chiaroscuro lighting , surrealistic settings and, frequently, a remarkable fluidity of mobile framing." Flashback adds that German Expressionism "concentrated on a heavy use of light and dark contrasts, exaggeration, tilted angles, a dream like atmosphere" and "German films of this area are united by their uncanny evocation of stimmung ..."

As Pam Cook points out World War One contributed the development of German film productions. After the closure of the borders the German film producer had to provide the domestic film market with their own products. According to Kracauer, the number of film productions rose from 28 in 1913 to 245 in 1919. Unfortunately the films quality wasn't as good as the quantity. At this time German films were either commercial ones or copies of foreign films.

At the end of 1917 the German military (Oberste Heeresleitung) and the government founded the Universum Film AG (Ufa) in order to influence German cinema audience with propaganda films. "Almost at once Ufa became the major production company in Germany" and took over a lot of other important film production companies and their directors, cameramen, actors, architects etc. In order to attract the domestic market the film producer had to increase the quality of the films.



"The end of the Fist World War [in 1918], the collapse of the November uprising and massive inflation all contributed to an export boom in the German film industry that began in 1919." "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is generally regarded as the film which first brought Expressionism to the German cinema." "It is also one of the most typical examples." However it is "the story of a madman's fantasies filmed with starkly artificial sets made up cardboard backdrops or painted cubist shadows, which effectively suggested the disorientation of the storyteller's mind." "We see the world as the hero does. The world of the film is literally a projection of the hero's vision."

As Siegfried Kracauer describes in "From Hitler To Caligari" Caligari's authors Carl Meyer and Hans Janowitz original story had been essential changed by Director Wiene. While Meyer's and Janowitz' story exposed the madness inherent in authority, Wiene's Caligari glorified authority and convicted its antagonist of madness. Wiene wanted his Caligari to be a commercial film that answers to mass desires. With "his instinctive submission to the necessities of the screen" he put the originally story into a framing story that introduces the hero Francis as a madman.

Caligari was designed by three expressionist artists. One of them, Hermann Warm, claimed: "The film image must become graphic art." I thought that the whole film could have been performed on stage. Watching Caligari I felled being reminiscent of costly scened dramatisations. Kracauer mentioned that in accordance with Warms' belief, "the canvases and draperies of Caligari abounded in complexes of jagged, sharp pointed forms strongly reminiscent of gothic patterns. Except for a few slips or concessions-some backgrounds opposed the pictorial convention in too direct a manner, while others all but preserved them- the settings amounted to a perfect transformation of material objects into emotional ornaments."

From my point of view it is very interesting that Caligari was completely shot in the studio. It seems as if the camera did not take the plunge to go on the streets. Krakauer pointed out that their withdrawal into the studio was part of the general German retreat into a shell. I personally think that as well as a shell the studio offered much more possibilities for the film producers to express abstract thoughts. In the early 20th century some big art forms such as the painting moved towards bigger abstraction, "less topic but more art" as James Monaco quotes. The art of film making wanted to be as pretentious as e.g. the painting. Monaco adds that "the expressionist film maker had big manipulative power to create a popular art form in the studio." The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari was a big success in the United States, France and other countries after its release in the early 1920 "while the Germans were to close to Caligari to appraise its symptomatic value." "The French coined the term "Caligarisme" and applied it to a postwar world seemingly all upside down; which at any rate, proves that they sensed the film's bearing on the structure of society." After its release in the United States in April 1921 it gained "world fame." Because of its success, other films in the expressionist style soon appeared. But Jerzy Toeblitz points out that the following German expressionist films never have been as self-contained and harmonic in their expressionistic style as Caligari.

One of the last Decla-Bioscob films to be made before Ufa took over was Der muede Tod (Destiny). "Death personified by a morose, black-clad, ashen faced man, enters a tavern where flowers wilt and a cat arches his back." The successful three hours film Dr. Mabuse der Spieler is about a gambler who makes a fortune on the stock exchange and as Pam Cook points out "it can be related to the economic conditions of contemporary Germany..." In 1922 another short lived Studio, Prana Film, supplied Ufa with Nosferatu. Murnau's conception of Dracula "as a rat in human form" was successful on the box office with its "gothic subject matter and visual style." while Warning Shadows (Schatten) "exemplifies all the stylistic features of German Expressionism" but "only found a response among film aesthetes."

While the German economy recovered and the US. Dawes Plan helped to stabilise the country in 1924 the German film industry suffered a great deal. In times of inflation films were cheap and therefor easy to sell on foreign markets. Now as the mark was stabilised, expressionist film budgets were rising and "foreign films came in more frequently, offering a degree of competition unknown in Germany for nearly a decade." "The export boom in the film industry collapsed almost as swiftly as it had started..." Therefor the two part project Die Niebelungen, a historical epic shot in 31 weeks(!) and The last Laugh by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau were a "commercial failure" although The last Laugh " received laudatory press notices." "Murnau was the first to make camera movement a style sufficient into itself."

As Pam Cook quotes "Expressionism as a national movement died out around 1924, though Expressionist tendencies can be found in later German films..." Metropolis (1926) "made effective use of miniatures and other special effects." This vision of the world of the future was the most expensive German film up to that date "production costs exceeded 5 million marks." Its Director Fritz Lang "had employed some 800 actors, 30000 extras and taken 310 days and 60 nights of filming." "Metropolis greatness is in its design, its geometric use of shapes as well as of masses of people." "The film works as a critcism of the manipulative capitalist system which both oppresses the people and transforms them into a monstrous destructive power."

As Georges Sadoul has pointed out, an expressionist tendency lingered on in many of the German films even into such 1930s films as Lang's M (1930)" M and Kameradschaft were some early sound films had international success. By 1933, when M was finally released in America it's half-Jewish director Fritz Lang as well as it's world famous stars Peter Lorre and Marlene Dietrich, Robert Wiene, Billy Wilder etc. emigrated to the United States before Adolf Hitler came to power in January 1933...


Conclusion

The Geman expressionist cinema from 1919 to 1933 released some very successful films that were able to compete with the American cinema. In 1919 after Word War One "Germany entered a period of unrest and confusion, a period of hysteric despair and unbridled vice full of the excesses of an inflation-ridden country" as director Fritz Lang captured the psychological mood. "The terror of social pressure could be found again in the soul of one's own as the suffering from an irrational evil." German movies began to thrive on "the constant, ever-present yearning for the fantastic, the mysterious, the macabre, for the strangling terror of the dark." The German film industry boomed until 1924 when the Dawes plan brought stabilisation to the German industry "and the German soul". Though the expressionist movement died out in 1924 there had been a big influence on later films such as Metropolis (1926), M (1931) and Kameradschaft (1931) and on a trend in film style.

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German Expressionist Cinema - From Caligari to Metropolis
By A. Wolf


After theWorld War I and until the arising of the Nazism at the beginning of the 1930s, Germany was the birthplace of a new movie style based in the stylistic features of the expressionist movement such as the use of the chiaroscuro, oneiric atmospheres and exaggerated angles and compositions. The exact birth date of this movement must be placed at the end of 1917, when the Universum Film AG (UFA) was founded by the German government and military.

There are a lot of in-depth studies about this movement on books, magazines and even in the WWW, but this little essay is only my original and personal reflection about the films I had the opportunity to watch –and love.

Caligari! CALIGARI!!

Directed in 1919 by Robert Wiene, The cabinet of Dr. Caligari is the most paradigmatical film of the early German expressionism.

Brief synopsis: an ambulant fair visits a small German town. Main attraction at that fair is Dr. Caligari's stand, where a somnambulist named Cesare (Conrad Veidt) is advertised. One of the visitors asks the somnambulist an extremely brainy question: “How long will I live?” The freak answers: “You will die tomorrow…” Interestingly, the man –instead of laughing- seems very worried about the somnambulist's prediction. Even more interestingly, he dies the day after…

The art direction was managed by Walter Reimann and Walter Roehrig, fellow members of the “Der Sturm group”, a Berlin expressionist art group, featuring world famous artists such as Bruno Taut and Herwarth Walden. They created an original, fantastic makeup that fills the film with a delirium-like imagery, and emphasizes the protagonist's own psycho-destruction.

Caligari's brutal domination over the half-somnambulist/ half-zombie Cesare is easily interpretable as a metaphor of the fascist and authoritarian governments that arose in Europe in the first half of the XX century, as Siegfried Kracauer explains in his famous book From Caligari to Hitler.

Murnau's Nosferatu

Don't ask me how, but some years ago I was lucky enough to obtain a copy of Friedrich Murnau's earliest surviving film, Schloß Vogeloed (The Haunted Castle, 1921). I was not really thrilled by it, but the beauty of the makeup, the strange and disturbing ending and the stunning use of the chiaroscuro were enough to make me to introduce in Murnau's light/dark universe, which will reach its zenith in the movie I'll review now.

One year after filming Schloß Vogeloed, Murnau was ready to film his undisclosed masterwork: Nosferatu, eine symphonie des grauens is based on Bram Stoker's novel Dracula , but a lawsuit with the writer's widow forced Murnau to change some aspects of the movie, such as the title or the name of the protagonist (Count Orlok) Nevertheless, it was not enough, and, due to the lawsuit, almost all copies of the film were destroyed. The Deutsche Film Production was able to save one of them, and the movie was finally premiered in the USA in 1929.

Max Schreck's incredible performance as sinister Count Orlok(extremely slim, pale, rat-like teeth, crow-like nose, like a Transylvanian version of The Simpson's Mr. Burns), the charm and painterly of its landscapes, and the lyrical beauty of the texts place the film at the pinnacle of the horror genre. Nosferatu is the most cryptical and necrophilic, but also oneiric and romantic film based on the Transylvanian vampire, a true masterwork that neither Tod Browning, Terence Fisher or Francis Ford Coppola have never surpassed.

Metropolis

Along with Stanley Kubrick's 2001, a space odyssey (1968) and Ridley Scott's Blade Runner (1982), Fritz Lang's Metropolis is considered the height of the then called sci-fi cinema. The influence in both posterior films is evident: Blade Runner 's opening sequences of the dark, futurist, neo-industrial L.A. seems to pay tribute to Metropolis astonishing cityscapes (see picture left), while in Kubrick's masterpiece the tribute is even in the title: Metropolis story line occurs in year 2000, and Kubrick place his film one year after as a tribute.

But while Blade Runner and 2001 predictions had been quite erroneous (I haven't seen any replicant out there, and Saturn is still a bit difficult to reach) Metropolis fatalist vision of the working class is a cruel metaphor still valid in our times. Almost 40 years later, and with no direct relationship with this film, Julio Cortázar wrote a sentence that resumes by itself Metropolis tragic message: “…mankind will begin to be worthy of his name the day in that the exploitation of the human being by the human being stop”

The Art Wolf

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Surreal Cinema Fando y Lis - A. Jodorowsky - 1967

We will be covering Surreal Cinema Art here with some frequency....Henry_Allen

Article Below by Steve Puchalski at Shock Cinema

Just when I thought I'd run out of Alexandro Jodorowsky films to fawn over

(psychedelic mindbenders EL TOPO and THE HOLY MOUNTAIN, as well as debacles like

TUSK and THE RAINBOW THIEF), I locate a copy of his earliest feature. (Actually,

the guy's first film is lost, according to all sources. Based on "The Severed

Heads" by Thomas Mann, it was a fable done in mime, and even Jodorowsky doesn't

have a copy.) This definitely shows what was to come from this unorthodox,

inconsistent genius. Based on Fernando Arrabal's play (which Jodorowsky had

previously directed on stage), the flick was castrated by its distributors,

Cannon Films, after causing a fracas at the Acapulco Film Festival for being too

"corrupting"...Working with no budget to speak of, and filmed on weekends, the

production reeks with Bunuel influenced surrealism and pretensions. Sergio

Klainer and Diana Mariscal star as the title characters, a young couple in

search of the enchanted city of Tar, where ecstasy can (supposedly) be found.

Fando is impotent, Lis is paralyzed, and together they travel across a rocky

landscape (with the bleach blonde Lis wheeled along or carried), equipped with

their only possessions, a drum and an old fashioned phonograph. Basically, it's

a road movie that takes these holy innocents nowhere, as they encounter bizarre

characters, experience childhood flashbacks, play cruel jokes on each other, and

sit on rocks, rambling banalities. They argue, they split up (Fando runs off and

Lis sits there bawling), they get back together, and when Fando gets sick of her

whining, he drags Lis around by the feet. Sure, there are plenty of striking

images along the way (i.e. a musician sits amidst urban rubble, playing a

flaming piano), but the first half of this flick is an incoherent, maddeningly

edited mess that makes even Fellini's most indulgent work look coherent. It's

not until Jodorowsky ups the tripped-out absurdity that the movie begins to hit

you on a gut level. Such as when Fando is whipped by a bikinied torturess and

eyed by some horny transvestites, or encounters vampires drinking snifters of

blood (as an additional note, Jodorowsky said that all on-screen blood was

real). And what other director would keep a straight face while live pigs are

being pulled from Lis' vagina? (Yeah, you read that correctly.) Or when

supporting characters crawl into their own graves to perish, politely thanking

the grave digger as he covers 'em up? But if Jodorowsky wanted the title

characters to be enchanting kids, fouled by society's ills, he failed. Because

though his vision is charmingly morbid and scattered with unintentional laughs,

the leads are dead weight. Along the way, I realized I didn't care about either

of 'em or their heavyhanded quest. It's dense going for Jodorowsky amateurs, yet

a field day for fans of murky, symbolic baloney.