Customer Reviews

The Cabinet of Caligari

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Glynis Johns (Mrs. Banks in "Mary Poppins") stars as a woman who has a flat tire and finds herself first a guest and then a "prisoner" in an ultra modern house presided over by the sinister Dr.Caligari (Dan O'Herlihy). Bizarre experiences await her as she tries to escape. Strange other guests who may or may not have her best interests at heart are character actors J.Pat O'Malley, Constance Ford and Estelle Winwood. Plus O'Herlihy does double duty in two roles. The rather talky script is by Robert Bloch and the film seems like an extended "Twilight Zone" episode at times, which isn't a bad thing, but some may find it slow going. The acting is excellent however and there is a wild climax as Johns makes one last ditch effort to escape. "Caligari" is an in-name-only connection to the 1919 silent German classic but the aforementioned climax does owe a little to the expressionistic visuals of that film. The DVD is a fine print, I enjoyed it but "Caligari" is strictly a matter of taste experience. Plus it is very adult for the time as well with sex being a major part of the subject matter. Really weird twist ending too.

I won't give away the ending except to say that I wonder if the writer for the movie IDENTITY saw this as a kid and used the same premise??? I watched this flick wondering what the heck was going on, and why everything was so freakin weird. And then the ending blew me away! If your a fan of the Twilight Zone or Outer Limits. (the original versions) get this movie. Has the look and feel of those old shows and a great twist!!!! It so sad this is a forgotten GEM. I never saw it before, and I'm a young guy, but a huge fan of old 50's and 60's thrillers. Especially Hitchcockian stuff. And I love moody black and white films. And this is it. The shot were she is being interrogated and the chess board is the main focus of the shot is cool. Makes me think they are subconsciously trying to show the conflict and the warring between her and Caligari. The movie is in my top 20 classic thrillers. Don't let the first hour and change of weirdness fool you. The pay off is worth it, and everything makes sense. To a modern audience, that has seen everything 80 different ways, you can probably see it coming early on, but its still fun to watch, and I can only imagine what a shock the ending would have been to a simpler audience at a simpler time. And the movie delves into some crazy stuff for its time. Very cool! Two thumbs up. And Some one need to get me the name of Caligari's interior decorator, cause I'm all about his house. Not to mention is cool beard and freaky Freudian speak! Trust me, watch this movie. And buy the dvd. You'll want to see this one more than once.

IN ADDITION TO MY ABOVE COMMENTS: I know why they call this The Cabinet of Caligari. There is a direct connection between this film and the 1919 Silent Film! Do you know what it is? I do-

**SPOILER** DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THIS FILM. WILL RUIN THE FILM FOR YOU!

Ok, if you have seen the film, you realize the film is basically a dream. A dream of an unstable woman...or some claim Caligari himself. My verdict is still out on that one. But we definitely know it is the dream of someone unstable. And in an asylum. So what is the connection to the 1919 Silent Film. The original silent version has the exact same twist ending. The same underlying concept. In the original 1919 version all this weird stuff is happening you can't quite understand, and you find out at the end it is all the dream of an unstable asylum inmate. The two stories while told completely different, share the same ending and in a way the overall same concept. Both are about a crazy imagining a world in their head, and how strange a nightmare that can be. Which is again why it also in some ways reminds me of the film "IDENTITY"...another favorite of mine. But the relationship between these two films is more than a name. If if Robert Bloch hadn't intended it to be this way...in some strange way both film deal with the same ideas throughout, and share the exact same ending. In addition one of the reviews mentioned that he could not believe that the female star would want to commit suicide after being locked up for two days....what one has to remember is that this story is the produce of a disturbed mind, and has no real basis in reality. Things are happening around her, that her mind is transforming into something else. So she imagines she has been there for 2 days...but it could have been far longer. Or she could have been suicidal for many years, and being committed and locked up pushed her over the edge....in either case, to me it made perfect sense, once I understood everything was in her head. Also the relationship with her son, is a normal mother/son relationship once you realize she's crazy....in the conversations they have, he is speaking to her like a son...she is speaking to him like a love interest. Because she's crazy. And that's why in certain scenes he's so sad. He realizes from what she says she does not know he is her son. But is imagining he is something else. A hopeful lover/boyfriend? But it is interesting to re-watch the film, and see his reactions to her comments.

Robert Bloch, the author of PSYCHO, never wanted to call the film by its released name but the title was forced on him by the producer.

And many, many people seem confused over the "twist ending." Actually, there are TWO twists...

SPOLIER FOLLOWS!!!







Okay, at the end of the film, we realise that everything has happened in her mind -- all the threatening images and people were in HER MIND and a result of her psychosis.

But the twist WITHIN a twist is in the VERY LAST FRAME of the film, so keep watching. The last scene shows the camera pulling back and higher and you think it will just fade out on the sky. However, at the last instant, we see Dr. Caligari standing, giant-like, over the "scene" that has played out below/before him.

In other words, everything that just happened was all in HIS mind...it's like making a movie from God's perspective. Very odd and unsettling twist for a 1962 film!

While I haven't seen the original 1920 German release of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, I did get a chance to see the 1962 version last night, and from the various reviews I've read on both, they don't seem to share a lot in common. The 1962 version, with the screenplay written by Robert Bloch (Psycho, Torture Garden), was produced and directed by Roger Kay ("Perry Mason", "Naked City") and features Glynis Johns (Papa's Delicate Condition, Mary Poppins) and Dan O'Herlihy (Halloween III: Season of the Witch, RoboCop). Also appearing is Richard Davalos (Kelly's Heroes), Constance Ford (A Summer Place), Lawrence Dobkin (Patton), J. Pat O'Malley (The Wind in the Willows), and Estelle Winwood (The Magic Sword, Dead Ringer), whom I best remember as the character Miss Withers, the elderly, flatulent companion to Miss Jessica Marbles, in the film Murder by Death (1976).

As the film begins we see an attractive young blonde woman named Jane Lindstrom (Johns) tooling down a lonely road in a compact convertible. After a blow out, she's forced to hoof it to a gated residence looking for help. Before I proceed I'd recommend anyone who drives a car should at least learn how to change a tire, as if this were a skill Jane possessed, it might have saved her from the psychological nightmare she's about to endure. Anyway, turns out the swanky residence is home to an individual named Dr. Caligari (O'Herlihy), a psychoanalyst of sorts who, at first, seems completely charming and very hospitable, to the point of allowing Jane to spend the night due to the fact her car seems to have suffered a bit more damage than a flat tire. Things take a turn for the strange the next day as Jane, thinking she'll be leaving soon, has an upsetting encounter with Caligari, who begins asking her some rather intimate questions, resulting in Jane storming out of his study and discovering she's basically a prisoner in Caligari's house, which is essentially a fortress with its electric iron gates and guards both of the human and canine variety. Later on Jane meets other, various residents of the house, but there's a certain oddness about their behavior, something she can't quite put her finger on...over the next couple of days Jane, who's quite the drama queen I might add, spends her time trying to figure a way out, that is when she's not freaking out. Various opportunities for escape seem to present themselves, only to vanish just as quickly, forcing Jane to come to the realization that perhaps there's only one, real way out of her nightmare. Eventually Jane believes she's got things figured out, but one's perceptions can be deceiving, especially given the fact everything's relative...

If you're familiar with Robert Bloch you'll know his tales tend to feature a strong, psychological aspect, and that's definitely the case here. I did enjoy this film, but I have to say the first hour or so was quite frustrating as it seemed to move along very slowly, and the dialogue felt continually disjointed in that the mode in which some of the characters spoke wasn't something that seemed necessarily normal to me, especially with Jane herself. It's hard to describe, but if you've seen the film you probably know what I'm talking about. As far as the plot, after a while, but well before the surprise ending, I did sort of figure out what was going on, even though I was fuzzy on many of the actual specifics. This wasn't because I read up on the film prior to seeing it, but more so because I'm familiar with some of Bloch's other works. As I mentioned earlier, the film does sort of crawl along (for the first hour or so), but the last fifteen or twenty minutes made up for the rest as the revelations come pouring out like a perforated piñata spilling its goodies. I've tried to avoid revealing any of the good stuff for those who haven't had a chance to see the film, as those bits should be seen rather than related in a review. The story reminded me a lot of the late 1960s television show "The Prisoner", featuring Patrick McGoohan, in that both featured a central character trapped in unfamiliar, controlled surroundings populated with odd characters, few of whom seem able, or willing, to help. There was one aspect of the story that really annoyed the heck out of me and that comes as Jane, after various escape attempts have been thwarted, contemplates what she perceives to be her only, viable means of escape, one that includes taking an over dose of sleeping pills. Now get this, she's been prisoner for all of two days and she's already thinking about taking her own life? It wasn't like she was being physically tortured or forced to live in unbearable surroundings. I suppose everyone has his or her breaking point, but I mean come on, how are you going to throw in the towel after two days? Now you can see what I mean when I referred to Jane as a drama queen earlier. Suck it up, grow a pair, and find a way out, or die trying. As I said, I did have a general idea what was going on before the big revelation, but that really didn't lessen the surprise too much as I didn't have much in the way of specifics nailed down. I really liked how the pieces eventually fit together, even if some of them created some uncomfortable thoughts (I'm speaking specifically of the character of Mark, played by Richard Davalos, and his perceived relationship with Jane). All in all a fairly effective, often frustrating, psychological thriller, with a decent payoff.

The DVD features both the widescreen anamorphic (2.35:1) and fullscreen (1.33:1) of the film, and the picture quality is quite good. The audio, available in Dolby Digital stereo and mono in English, and Dolby Digital mono in Spanish, comes through very well. There's really not much in the way of extras except for a theatrical trailer for the film and subtitles in both English and Spanish.

Cookieman108

I remember seeing this movie on late, late, LATE, one night back in the latter part of the 70's when TV networks still showed a variety of weird and wonderful old movies. (Sadly these days it seems that networks replay the same ten movies over and over ad nauseum. Basically its the story of a woman who's car breaks down on a deserted road. She ends up at the estate of a wealthy man who seems to be keeping people prisoner there. But all is not as it seems. One of the better schlock films in my opinion.

The Cabinet of Caligari is a 1962 movie based loosely on The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, a 1919 silent film. Ironically, it is very modern.

This is the kind of movie that is hard to examine without giving too much away. A young woman's car breaks down on vacation, and she finds her way to a huge mansion. The man of the house, Caligari, is all too willing to make her his guest, and soon, Jane finds herself more a prisoner. There are others in the house, some who seem to be guests too, and others who appear to be more aligned with Caligari, and she tries to figure out her place there and a way out.

I loved this movie for the dialogue. Caligari's prodding words were even mixed into a Nine Inch Nails version of Queen's "Get Down Make Love." He says, "How old were you when you first let a man make love to you? Next, who was he? Next, how did you feel at the time? Next, how did you feel afterwards? What did you feel? What did you think? Were you pleased, frightened, ecstatic, disgusted? What did he say? What words did you speak? That's what I want to know. Now. Tell me. Now. Now. All of it, now. Tell me. YES!"

It was so strange the way characters acted totally familiar with each other on first meetings. On the first watch, I chalked this up to 60s styling, but after the plot is fully revealed, everything makes perfect sense.

This is a horror film much like Memento could be considered one, but I think that it wasn't easily defined by a genre in its time, and horror was the closest. There were moments with really weird editing, especially near the end, that seemed to try to "spook" things up. Those scenes are a little funny, but they do add to the movie as a whole.
Loved it!

What a great period film this is! It's a 1962 psychological thriller, almost a horror flick, and Dan O'Herlihy is brilliant in his role as "Caligari".

First, the technical information: this single disc offers viewers the option of EITHER widescreen [letterbox], or, fullscreen. (In my opinion, widescreen is the only way to watch it!). It's shot in black and white, digitized from a very clear 35 mm print, and the filmscore is absolutely superb, being of the '60s atmospheric genre (Gerald Fried, composer). And for those who need to know such things, this DVD IS copy-protected *.*

The short story is this: An attractive young woman touring the rural countryside in her little sports convertible has a blowout and is forced to hoof it several miles to a large and remote estate where Caligari and company welcome her in.

At first, things go okay but she soon discovers that she's sort of an unrestrained prisoner, clearly a cat's-paw, in a modernistic but VERY strange household. The suspense builds and reaches very creepy levels when the girl looks up from her bath and sees Caligari peering down at her, reminiscences of "Psycho"! Why won't they let her go? She endures one mental assault after another.

That's about as far as I can go without invoking a spoiler so I'll stop on the storyline there. To highlight other aspects of the film, all the actors' performance is superb, the locations are just super, and the sets are first-class and incredibly nostalgic of the late '50s- early '60s-period. A few of the camera angles and the magnificent but subtle filmscore really boosts the suspense of the movie.

As a matter of trivia, there is a previous old silent version of this film which critics seem to savour -- I have not viewed it. Also, this film was a lifesaver for 20th Century Fox studios (along with "The Longest Day") because "Cleopatra" was being filmed at the same time and was gobbling up millions of dollars, practically bankrupting the studio. This film coupled with "The Longest Day" (also shot in black and white) raked in an immediate lucrative box office return which kept Fox financially solvent until "Cleopatra" was laboriously completed.

Some folks will say that "The Cabinet of Caligari" drags, especially at first -- this is probably true if one is not really enthusiastic about baby boomer black and white nostalgic films. Honestly, I loved every minute of this movie and I particularly recommend it to those who are especially fond of this unique film genre. Others might consider it to be a 3-star flick, or possibly even lower. But I don't think that anyone who knows much about film can deny that this one is artfully conveyed.

Though this really has little in common with the silent movie masterpiece, THE CABINET OF CALIGARI offers viewers some great thrills and chills with Glynis Johns giving a cracker of a performance in the lead role. When Jane Lindstrom's (Johns) car breaks down, she gets taken in by the seemingly-gentle and kind Paul (Dan O'Herlihy). However `Paul' soon reveals his true identity of Caligari, a power-mad genius who entraps Jane and attempts to brainwash her. Featuring the glorious character-actress Estelle Winwood, as well as B-movie cutie Vicki Trickett; also among the cast are J. Pat O'Malley, Constance Ford and Richard Davalos.

This film has never before been released on video and only appears rarely on television and cable. Needless to say, a DVD release of this small gem has been a nice surprise. Fox has issued CABINET OF CALIGARI in deluxe 16:9 anamorphic widescreen (with a fullscreen version on the flipside of the disc). This movie is well worth your attention.

I was an impressionable 17-year-old back in 1962 when CALIGARI shocked the living daylights out of me. And to this day -- though, naturally, to a far lesser (suspenseful) degree (and despite some of its alleged "flaws") -- I can still sit through a performance of this haunting film in nearly rapt attention.

The main reasons for this are twofold: (1) The ever present youth in me can be easily summoned, so that contextually I am back in the early '60s, eager to reimmerse myself in the intensity of the dark psychodrama about to be played out, and blithely unencumbered by the need for (or expectation of) today's technologically superior special effects; and (2) Gerald Fried's ubiquitous, compelling film score music (especially the bittersweet main theme, played repeatedly in a multitude of beguiling variations) adds an immeasurable degree of enjoyment to this sadly underrated film.

Glynis Johns and Dan O'Herlihy turn in excellent performances as protagonist and "antagonist", respectively. And if, like myself, you're a Constance Ford fan, you'll enjoy her understated supporting role...wondering, until the very end, if she actually is what she apears to be.

The Cabinet of Caligari is as terrifying today as it was forty years ago. In my opinion, it is one of the best psychological thrillers of all time.