Faust (1926)

Originally posted to Facebook on 5/9/2018

Faust was our sixth film from 1926, and our third directed by F.W. Murnau. It was also our first German expressionist film since Metropolis, a few months earlier. Of course Metropolis was actually from 1927, but we had seen them out of order because we'd had the chance to see Metropolis on the big screen at the Alamo.

The movie stars Gösta Ekman as Faust, while Emil Jannings, whom we saw in Murnau's 1924 film The Last Laugh, plays the devil. Ekman would die in his forties in 1938, and Jannings would die in 1950 -- and make no movies during his final five years because of his Nazi affiliation during the war -- but the female lead Camilla Horn lived until 1996, and was appearing regularly in movies and TV up through the late eighties. (Bruce Springsteen also wrote a song about her, in a weird bit of trivia.)

In tone this film is probably closer to Murnau's 1922 film Nosferatu than The Last Laugh. It tells the familiar Faust story, with Jannings' devil granting Ekman his desires in exchange for his soul. The early parts of the film are dark and atmospheric, and the initial summoning scene in particular is quite strong and dramatic. Unfortunately not long after Faust signs his contract with the devil that intensity starts to seep away as Jannings becomes less threatening than comical. Ekman begins pursuing Horn, and Jannings in parallel pursues Horn's aunt as a distraction. Jannings' scenes in this section of the movie are broad and hammy and strangely light-hearted, given that Jannings is supposedly the incarnate force of ultimate evil. The movie rallies a bit in its final section, but overall it reminds me a bit of Lang's 1921 film Destiny, in that some striking scenes and images are undermined by stretches of not-terribly-amusing comedy.

Next week is our seventh and last film from 1926, The Black Pirate. It will be our first truly color film, and our fifth film starring Douglas Fairbanks. The list, as always, is here: https://bit.ly/2lZtfmT