Die Nibelungen
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Movie Reviews of Die Nibelungen
Movie Review: Great film, okay DVD
Summary: 5 Stars
This masterpiece of silent German cinema receives a solid, meat-and-potatoes treatment on DVD. Image quality varies greatly from scene to scene, but the new digital recording of Gottfried Huppertz's original film score is excellent.There aren't very many extras on this two-disc set: a still-frame essay, photo galleries, and a few minutes of rediscovered footage from the film's production are all featured on Disc 1. A scholarly audio commentary would have been a welcome touch, but you won't get it from Kino.
I'd rent this film instead of buying it, but it's undoubtedly a masterpiece of silent cinema. A must-have for true film buffs.
Movie Review: the real deal!
Summary: 5 Stars
Buy this DVD set. Whether you're a Fritz Lang fan, sort of interested in German cinema, curious about the aryan mythos that Hitler would later subvert, whatever got you here, this is just an amazingly excellent restoration of a great work of art. (It's great to see that an offical piece of "Film History" can be so... entertaining.) And next month we should be getting the newly restored (almost) METROPOLIS!Movie Review: Minor Quibble re Film Speed
Summary: 4 Stars
I saw the restored print of this film shown over two nights at the Music Box Theatre in Chicago in 1988 or 1989, with the original orchestral score transcribed for the theatre's immense pipe organ. It was one of the most enjoyable moviegoing experiences I've ever had, and I put off purchasing any version of this film until I found one based on that print. This DVD was therefore the end of a long wait for me, and well worth it.I do have one minor complaint, though. During the exhibition in Chicago, there was some explicit discussion by the curators about the difficulty of setting the film speed. (At that time, it was based on Lang's descriptive statements about the proper pace of a procession of Burgundian knights shown early in the film.) So I was very conscious of that speed when I watched this DVD, and it seems to me it clearly has been set too fast here. The actors' bodies move through space in an unnatural way, and it does reduce the effectiveness of some scenes. Particularly, it robs Siegfried's exaggeratedly formal, dancelike Delsarte-based postures of some of the dignity they maintained when the film didn't seem undercranked. The film would have fit on the two discs just as easily at a slower speed, so I'm not sure why this poor choice was made.
Movie Review: One of the greats
Summary: 4 Stars
A truly great silent film, here very well presented with footage that most of us have never seen before. The new orchestral track is a treat, though I still miss the old organ score with Wagnerian themes. This DVD is a model of How To Do It Right. For lovers of German culture and/or silent film, this DVD is a must.