"Faust" (1926)

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"Faust" movie from amazon.com

Product Description: Jan Svankmajer's long awaited follow up to his acclaimed "Alice" is an equally astounding version of the myth of Dr. Faustus. Merging live action with stop motion and claymation, Svankmajer has created an unsettling universe presided over by diabolic life size marionettes and haunted by skulking human messengers from hell. From The New Yorker: "A full-length feature from the Czech animation director Jan Svankmajer, his first since "Alice,'' in 1987. A tired Czech citizen is handed a map on the streets of Prague; it leads him to a shabby courtyard, a puppet theatre, and a bruising encounter with the powers of evil. He raises the Devil, only to be confronted by a replica of his own face: a typically bleak hint from Svankmajer that we invent our own temptations-that any of us would make a good Faust. The best introduction to Svankmajer remains his short films; "Faust" is less shocking, more narcotic. Still, with its blend of live action, chattering marionettes, and weird, fleshy stop-motion sequences-not to mention the pitch-black of the humor-it throws you off balance more thoroughly than any other movie in town." -Anthony Lane
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

DVD Release Date: September 2, 2003
Run Time: 97 minutes

"Faust" DVD ~ Gösta Ekman

Amazon.com: "F.W. Murnau's last German production before leaving for Hollywood is a visually dazzling take on the Faust myth. Pushing the resources of the grand old German studio UFA to the limits, Murnau creates an epic vision of good versus evil as devil Emil Jannings tempts an idealistic aging scholar with youth, power, and romance. The handsome but wan Swedish actor Gosta Ekman plays the made-over Faust as a perfectly shallow scoundrel drunk with youth, and the lovely Camilla Horn (in a part written for Lillian Gish) is the young virgin courted, then cast aside, by Faust. The drama falters in the middle with a tedious courtship and bizarre comic interludes, but the delirious images of the opening (Jannings enveloping a mountain town in his dark cloak of evil) and the high melodrama of the climax (Horn desperately clutching her baby while crawling, abandoned and lost, through a snowstorm) triumphs over such shortcomings. The sheer scale of Murnau's epic and the magnificent play of light, shadow, and mist on his exquisitely designed sets makes this one of the most cinematically ambitious, visually breathtaking, and beautiful classics of the silent era. --Sean Axmaker US Theatrical Release Date: December 6, 1926. Production Company: Universum Film A.G. (UFA). Actors: Gösta Ekman, Emil Jannings, Camilla Horn, Frida Richard, William Dieterle. Directors: F.W. Murnau. Format: Black & White, Subtitled, NTSC.Language: German. Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only.