Product Description

A horror film that surpasses all others. Alan relates the story of traveling magician Dr Caligari and Cesare. Their arrival in a town coincides with savage killings. Secretly Caligari was an asylum director who hypnotizes Cesare to re enact murders. But the final reel contains something which will leave an audience shattered. It blows away all your moral certainties and beliefs. This is the true power of its horror. To leave you vulnerable and uncertain of what you feel was secure and certain.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9183 in DVD
• Released on: 2009-11-16
• Rating: Universal, suitable for all
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Black & White, Full Screen, PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 72 minutes

Synopsis
This silent film, set in the Middle Ages, tells the eerie story of a murderous sleepwalker who prowls the streets late at night in search of victims.

Customer Reviews

The oldest must-see film for horror fans
Caligari is essential viewing if you have an interest in seeing how film techniques developed, or in understanding the genesis of the horror movie. It doesn't follow that you'll enjoy the experience, but it is guaranteed that you won't forget it. The film has a strange other-worldy feel that exerts a bizarre fascination, sort of Thomas Ligotti meets a silent stage version of Carnivale. The story is one that is the cornerstone of many a horror tale featuring a mad scientist, a sinister carnival show, an insane asylum, a murderous sleep-walker. Even more impressively the tale has a clever flashback framing story structure and features one of the earliest and most effective plot twists, one that will be surprising and yet be familiar to horror fans.

The acting comes, of course, from a different era, being effectively pantomime like in its excessive displays of emotion that appears odd even if you've seen plenty of other silent cinema. But the acting works because it fits into the unifying style of a film that features sets that provide some of the most bizarre ever presented on screen, and highly influential for films like Frankenstein. They are angular and unreal or often just painted backdrops. This expressionist vision helps to create a dream-like mood that is distinctly creepy. Most satisfyingly the sets tell you things about the state of mind of the characters and ultimately they have a role in explaining what the story has been about.

So, this is worth watching if you have an interest in this sort of thing, although, like me, I have a feeling that even if you don't enjoy it the first time, a few years on it'll draw you back in to watching it again.

great film - terrible version
I love this film and was overjoyed to see it re-released on DVD, thinking it would be better quality than my old version - I was wrong

The film itself is, of course, magnificent, but this version 1) has poor picture and sound quality b) lacks the original expressionist style artistic story inserts (instead has boring black and white normal type ones) and c) does not have the variety of colour washes/tints in my previous version which i think add a lot of atmosphere

pretty much a waste of money.