The cinema as a graphic art : on a theory of representation in the cinema (1959)

CREATIVE PROBLEMS OF THE ART OF THE CAMERA-MAN iitative influences, consisted mainly of a search for new methods of lighting, I» emergence of expressionist elements in certain camera-men's work has a iher different motivation. We cannot go into an ideological analysis of expressionism and its social dgins, but must confine ourselves to summarising its characteristic creative ndencies, and to stating the essence of the expressionist philosophy. Never was there a time shaken with such terror, with such mortal fear [says Hermann ;hr]. Never was the world so mortally dumb. Never was man so small. Never was ]| so timid. Never was joy so far away and freedom so dead. Need is clamant, man < nmons his soul, time becomes a cry of need. Art adds its cry to the darkness, it calls 1* help, it calls for its soul : that is expressionism. The influence of expressionism on the cinema as a whole, and on the German aema of the inflation period in particular, was so obvious that it calls for no :ecial demonstration. We will consider only certain expressionist influences iiich are of interest to us from the aspect of the representational elements of Ims. We must note that these influences were manifested in camera-man's art uch later than in film direction. In carrying out the director's creative tasks |e camera-man by no means immediately finds the corresponding formal methods id technical resources for those tasks. This explains why the earliest films of ;is tendency were not characteristic of ' cinematographic expressionism ', judged Dm this aspect. It is usual to regard the well-known film, " The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari ", ade by the director Robert Wiene, as a typical example of expressionism in m production. But in this film expressionism was applied chiefly in the formu :ion of the sets, the costumes, and the directorial treatment, and not (with the ception of the lighting), by means of the specific resources of the camera-man's aft, which as a whole were exploited realistically. We suggest that we have look for expressionism in the camera-man's work not so much in this film, as | the compositional peculiarities and methods of shooting which are to be found ; a number of shots in other later films which were not generally regarded as :pressionist. Elements of expressionist treatment of the shot are to be found in many erman films during the years 1920 to 1923. But especially interesting are the ms " Nos Ferata "j1 "Destiny", " Raskolnikov ", and the Pabst-Zeber film Secrets of the Soul ", in which an attempt was made to present on the screen !.e Freudian method of psycho-analysis. " Unnaturally sourced " light, compositional asymmetry, pictures extremely it of focus, hypertrophied close-ups taken in an abstract, symbolic cut-out jask giving the frame limits a new shape, a high intensivity of the visual image volving a deliberate modification of reality, are all obvious features of this tenancy in the camera-man's art. In expressionism we have not a passive treatment of the object by means of impressionist light and shade, exploited on the isis of the greatest possible approximation to naturalism, but a vital modification ! the real visual image, subordinating reality to the inventions of the creative ;ind. In " Nos Ferata " (directed by Murnau) the camera-man Wagner shot a bare, ilfruined brick wall with sharp and deep shadows. Passing up the wall, the oomy, sharply outlined shadows with their strong tonal contrast, the sharply 1A pirated version of "Dracula". — Ed. 159