FRAGMENTS (SCHEBERN) (SHATTERED)
Germany, 1921, 61 minutes, Black and white.
Werner Krauss, Edith Posca.
Directed by Lupu Pick.
Fragments is an interesting early German silent film. It was written by Carl Mayer, who wrote The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. However, unlike the mainstream of German films from 1919, this film is not expressionist. In fact, it was intended as an anti-expressionist experimental film. The realism that it uses is reminiscent of the Italian neorealism of the post-war period. The acting style is generally measured (though the women leads have some histrionics later in the film). There is a measured pace about the film - even though it shows fragments of what has become a very trite situation but which is presented here dramatically and with intensity. The film shows a railway linesman and his conventional home and the disruption by a seducer inspector and the subsequent revenge. There is a use of symbolism throughout the film: the railway line, breaking windows, broken glass fragments. Werner Krauss, who portrayed Caligari, is the linesman. Direction is by actor Lupu Pick who did not make many films as director. His wife, Edith Posca, portrays the linesman's daughter. Brief but an interesting contrast with the German expressionist films of the time.
1. The quality of this 1921 film? The tradition of German expressionism and surrealism? The contrast with the writing of this film, its visual style, sets and decor, acting? Realism with symbols? The film considered as experimental in its time? The lack of titles and the reliance on acting, situation, feeling and mime?
2. The quality of the realistic black and white photography, lighting? Exteriors and interiors? Light and darkness? Shadows? The slow pace and style of the film? Realistic sets? The realism of the train? The focus on individuals, groups? Static scenes, scenes of motion? The opening out to society at the end?
3. Characterisation, intensity, mime? Long close-ups? The actors speaking - without our hearing? The feel for the characters and their situations? The effect of the slow pace? Acting styles and the women's melodramatics?
4. The basic plot of passion, conscience, guilt? Individuals? Society? In Germany of its time? The ordinary linesman and his murdering the authority figure? His confession to society and their reaction?
5. The long sequences establishing the family, the focus on the father and his work, mother and her cooking, the daughter at home? The meal sequence and the eating of the soup? The inter-editing of the Morse code message? The broken window and the win suddenly interrupting the tranquil how?
6. The use of symbols: the rails, the overhead shot of the father and his walking along the rails, the window and the glass breaking into fragments, the fragments behind the credits, the sweeping up of the glass fragments, their reappearing at the end, the shadows? the father on the door of the inspector's room, the signals?
7. The structure of the film with the succession of days, fragments as well as the process of the interaction of the characters?
8. The father, his age, work, the ordinary linesman, his room, meals, sleep, his grief and his searching for his wife, her death, his mourning her, the daughter telling him the truth, his anger, confronting the inspector, killing him, signalling the train, the confession "I am a murderer"?
9. The mother, cooking, the meal, her suspicions about her daughter and the inspector, the axe and the knocking down of the door, her grief (and melodramatics), wandering the snow, the prayer at the wayside shrine, her death, being carried back to the house, her burial?
10. The daughter, her place in the house, her cleaning and the inspector standing on the stairs above her, her being caught by her mother, her worried reaction, grief, the time passing, her mother's death, her father's anguish, her vengeance and whispering the truth to her father?
11. The inspector, his arrival, his coming down the stairs and his boots, standing above the daughter - symbol of seduction, the seduction scene and his coming to the door, coolly smoking, seeing him at work, his nonchalance, combing his hair in his room, the confrontation with the father and his being strangled?
12. The contrast with the train, the fashionable people, eating, gossipping, puzzled by the confession?
13. The melodramatic ending with the confession? The father's understanding of his passion, guilt?
14. The train continuing to go by: society and its concerns and lack of concern? The passionate crises of individuals? Germany 1921?
