Faust

MOVIE DESCRIPTION:

Faust was the mammoth German production which won F. W. Murnau his contract with Hollywood's Fox Studios. Emil Jannings glowers his way through the role of Mephistopholes, who offers the aging Faust (Gosta Eckman) an opportunity to relive his youth, the price being Faust's soul. Though highly stylized, the film is unsettlingly realistic at times, especially during the execution of the unfortunate Gretchen. Even in old age, actress Camilla Horn could recall how close she came to genuine immolation when Murnau burned her at the stake. An American version of Faust had been planned earlier as a Mary Pickford vehicle, but Pickford's mother wanted no part of a film in which her darling daughter strangled her own baby. The scenario for Faust touches lightly upon the previous retellings by Goethe and Marlowe, but is more heavily reliant on the paintings of Pietr Breughel. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

DVD FEATURES:

• Number of Discs: 2
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 (Pre-1954 Standard)
• Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo
• Screen: Black and White
• Features:
  • New musical score by the mont alto motion picture orchestra in 5.1 stereo surround or 2.0 stereo
  • Additional piano scoreby Perez De Azpeitia, adapted from the original 1926 orchestral arrangment
  • "The Language of Shadow: Faust," a 53 minute documentary on the making of Murnau's film
  • The lost screen test footage of Ernst Lubitsch's abandoned 1923 production Margeurite and Faust
  • Set designs by Robert Herlth
  • Photo gallery
  • Notes on the mont alto score
  • Essay by film historian Jan Christopher Horak

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

• Cast:

  
       Gosta Ekman - Faust
       Emil Jannings - Mephisto
       Camilla Horn - Marguerite
       Werner Fuetterer - Archangel
       Frida Richard - Mother
       William Dieterle - Valentin
       Yvette Guilbert - Marthe
       Eric Barclay - Duke of Parma
       Hanna Ralph - Duchess of Parma
       Hans Brausewetter - Farmboy

• Director:

  F.W. Murnau

• Producer:

  Erich Pommer, David Shepard

• Play Author:

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

• Cinematographer:

  Carl Hoffmann

• Composer (Music Score):

  Werner Richard Heymann, Timothy Brock

• Featured Music:

  The Olympia Chamber Orchestra

• Production Designer:

  Robert Herlth, Walter Röhrig

• Costume Designer:

  Robert Herlth, Walter Röhrig

REVIEW:

• While not as well known today as Nosferatu or The Last Laugh, Faust is perhaps director F.W. Murnau's masterpiece; few films by any director can match it for the sweeping impact and beauty of its visuals or the power of its storytelling. Murnau approaches Goethe's tragedy of a man who learns all too well the price of his soul with appropriately broad dramatic strokes, and if the effect seems a bit over the top in the early reels, it hits with full melodramatic force at the end; the full, horrible impact of Faust's comeuppance is as disturbing today as it was in 1926. Gosta Ekman is fine as the luckless Faust and Emil Jannings is brilliant as Mephisto, the embodiment of cunning and evil. And the camerawork by Carl Hoffman and production design by Robert Herlith and Walter Rohrig are nothing short of astounding, creating a brilliantly controlled and beautifully painterly visual sense that's the ideal backdrop for this fable. Anyone who thinks of silent films as sluggish and amateurish has obviously never seen Faust; the home video release on Kino compliments the film's striking visuals with a superb original score by the American composer Timothy Brock that's worthy of attention on its own merits. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi