Sunrise

A film of enchantment, like a never-ending dream: the sum and climax of Murnau's work. This German film, shot in Hollywood and set in the East Prussian-American no man's land, consists of an effortless and totally controlled sequence of opposites that ignite one another: Man and woman, love and rapture, city and country, studio and nature, tragedy and comedy, lyrical mood and drama, depth of field and soft melting. The camera dissolves boundaries that are in a constant state of flux, errant reflections and shadows weave themselves into ever-changing ornaments, and the flow of movement encompasses all the outer and inner layers of this masterpiece, about which a critic wrote in 1984: "If there were no films like this, what could justify the existence of cinema today?" (Harry Tomicek)

Photo: Austrian Film Museum