Weimar effects: Cinematic space and cultural transformation

"Weimar Effects" examines the cinematic works of the Weimar Republic (1918–1933) and post-WWII film that map the cinematic, cultural, and ideological space of early twentieth century Germany. I read filmic texts—of Expressionism, foreign encounters, and "street films"—as revisionist counter-narratives to national and pseudo-scientific theories, and technological advancement.;Each chapter of the dissertation positions a reading of cinematic within the distinct cultural space of Germany and in relation to scientific concepts and theories of modernism. Chapter One, "German Encounters," reads filmic representations of foreign spaces (Fritz Lang's The Spiders, Joe May's The Indian Tomb, Robert Reiner's Opium ) as responses to the increasing influences of early ethnographic and anthropological discoveries and studies. My second chapter interrogates the historical inscriptions that conflate "Expressionist" cinema with Weimar national culture. I re-examine the genre and focus on the "carnivalesque" as a formal feature that translates literary techniques of Expressionism onto the cinematic medium. In my third chapter I consider Weimar's "street films" as engagements with the increasing modernization and urbanization of a country that is still predominantly steeped in rural traditions. I read the extensive range of cinematic techniques as emblematic of Weimar's fascination with modernity and consider the socio-cultural promises of the Weimar Republic, in particular social mobility. My final chapter focuses on Rainer Werner Fassbinder's and Karyn Kusamer's cinematic returns to Weimar. I investigate how Fassbinder's Berlin Alexanderplatz (1980) simultaneously represents a nostalgic return to the Berlin of Alfred Döblin's novel (Berlin Alexanderplatz , 1929) and the divided Berlin of the 1980s. Kusamer's Æon Flux reduces the appearance of history in the setting and transforms of very distinct and pluralistic background of Berlin into a futuristic monochromatic cityscape. I argue that this transformation points to a "crisis of history." Taken together, these chapters complicate Weimar fictions of national and individual subjectivity. At the same time, my project emphasizes the counter narratives of filmmakers who critically confront these models of social and cultural ontology and epistemology.