The Street (1923) User Reviews

The Expressive Street

[Cineanalyst · 8/10 · 6 June 2006]

This film inaugurated a few "street films" in Weimar Germany, including, notably, "The Joyless Street" (Die Freundlose Gasse)(1925). Additionally, horrific and expressionistic street scenes feature prominently in many films of this era. The street in this film is quite remarkable. Apparently, the action, automobiles and all, takes place entirely within studio sets, giving the filmmakers control over the lighting. And, the lighting is great, with nighttime-like scenes full of shadows and darkly lit corners. Staircases are also featured prominently, as they are in many German pictures of the time.

"The Street" is simply about a man, who leaves his wife and humdrum life to seek the excitement of a Parisian street. He spends most of the story chasing after a prostitute thief, which eventually leads him to prison and despair. He then returns to his previous life. Siegfried Kracauer, in "From Carlgari to Hitler: A Psychological History of the German Film", says the film is about going from rebellion to submission--foretelling the German people's submission to the Nazi regime. "The Street" is also another of Carl Meyer's "instinct films", as Kracauer calls them, which also includes "Backstairs" (Hintertreppe)(1921) and, most notably, "The Last Laugh" (Der Letzte Mann)(1924). The characters in these films act instinctively, which affords their stories to transcend intertitles. As with the other "instinct films", there are few intertitles in "The Street".

The lack of many title cards enhances the visual qualities of the picture. Moreover, the street itself seems to take on a life of its own. It enters the film by tempting the man with a shadow play on his ceiling. And, as fellow commenter hhole mentioned, an optometrist's shop sign makes it seem as though the street is watching the man. "The Street" is impressively photographed and innovative for its expressionistic visuals and embodiment of the street.

Expressionism and Impressionism all rolled into one

[springfieldrental · 8/10 · 23 December 2021]

Karl Grune's direction offered a heavy dose of German Expressionism in November 1923's "The Street." What's unique in the Austrian director's co-written script is how two seemingly separate stories merge in the finale while large anonymous city streets take on as a character unto itself. The street is one big expressionistic nightmare, serving as a catalyst for danger and chaos to the movie's protagonist (Eugen Klopfer).

In an unique dual aesthetic rare in cinema, "The Street" was filmed showing both expressionistic visuals of a city's bustling activity while at the same delving deeply into our protaganist's feelings and thought by capturing symbolic impressionistic images. The focal point of "The Street" is on a restless married man whose drawn outside to the excitement of the metropolitan avenues by looking from the inside of his mundane domestic quarters with his one-dimensional wife. We see his point-of-view looking out the window through dreamy, kaleidoscopic-layered split screens. Also, once on the street, he sees a streetwalker, whose head turns into a skull, foretelling the potential fatal adventures that's awaiting him.

While Klopfer walks the streets, an old blind man, (Max Schreck, the actor who was the vampire in 1922's 'Nosferatu') is guided by his young grandson. "The Street" oozes with symbols: a neon sign boldly leads Klopfer to a cabaret where he gets snared by a hooker, while a sign in front of an optometrist office with gigantic eyes, pointing out the street sees everything. Klopfer is eventually brought to the blind man and his grandson's apartment. A murder takes place, with Klopfer, who started out in the movie just looking for a little fun in the streets, being accused of the killing.

"The Street" served as a template for future German 'street films' where the main or pivotal explanatory action takes place on city venues. "The Street" became Jewish director Grune's pinnacle achievement. When the Nazi's came into power, he left Germany in 1933 , immigrating to England, where he directed three films. He later turned to producing movies, remaining in England until his death in 1962.

Sin City

[richardchatten · 8/10 · 16 June 2019]

The plot is broadly similar to Murnau's more upbeat 'Sunrise' a few years later, which also centred upon a stylised city teeming with prostitutes and spivs elaborately recreated from scratch. Although superficially a 'realistic' subject, Karl Grune's fanciful direction emphasises what would now be called the 'noirish', and on the strength of this one would have expected him to have ended his days in Hollywood rather than Bournemouth.

(Since German films were popular with sophisticated American audiences at the time, it's quite possible that F.Scott Fitzgerald saw the film - or at least stills from it - hence the reappearance of the enormous spectacles that famously dominate one scene in the book he was working upon at the time, 'The Great Gatsby'. The deathshead makeup worn by a lady of the night early on also anticipates the yuppie aliens in John Carpenter's 'They Live'.)

a great film

[hhole · 10/10 · 7 April 2002]

This highly influential movie was the first of the German "Street" films. It tells the story of one night in which a middle aged man is lured away from his happy home into the thrills and dangers of the city streets. The city is an expressionistic nightmare, a dangerous and chaotic place. The unfortunate man encounters thieves, prostitutes, and other predators. But the real threat to security and order is the street itself. In one extraordinary scene the bumbling man passes an optometrist's shop on a crooked, deserted street. The moment his back is turned, an enormous neon sign, a pair of eyeglasses, blinks on. The street itself is alive and watching.

The blindness of Fate.

[brogmiller · 8/10 · 14 February 2024]

This excellent piece by Karl Grune, yet another of Max Reinhardt's gifted pupils, is arguably this director's most important contribution to Weimer cinema. Forms and genres in Germany during this period were often intermingled and although very much a template for 'Street' films it shows the influence of Carl Mayer's 'Chamber' films and it is in fact Mayer who has provided the original idea.

The studio sets are magnificent and depict the milieu that defines the characters' lives, the crowd scenes are well choreographed and Grune's brilliant cinematographer Karl Hasselmann provides the expressionist lights and shadows that represent what the poet Shelley called 'the twin destinies of Hope and Fear'. The visual element and storytelling are such that few intertitles are required.

None of the protagonists is named but the characterisations are superb, notably Eugen Kloepfer as 'middle-aged man', Aud Egede-Nissen as 'the prostitute' and Max Schreck of 'Nosferatu' fame as 'the blindman'.

We are happily spared the 'specially composed score' that blights so many silent films and great use has been made of Dvorak's Eighth Symphony, at least in the version I saw.

All-in-all, another gem from what is indisputably the Golden Age of German cinema.

Silent suspense

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 17 June 2016]

"Die Straße" or "The Street" is a German-language black-and-white silent film from 1923, so not that long anymore until it has its 100th anniversary. The writer and director is the Austrian-born Karl Grune and it is maybe his most famous work. At 75 minutes, it is shorter than many of the other (occasionally very long) German silent films. The biggest name in the cast is certainly Max Schreck, even if he does not play the main character in here. I personally am not too much a fan of the genre, but this little movie here had a good moment or two sometimes and it stayed fairly essential because of the small runtime. Nonetheless overall, I did not have too much of a great viewing performance and that's why I do not recommend it. Still, if that time and genre is something you like, you can still check it out as my dislike is mostly subjective here.