Rahpooye Honar/Performing Arts

Rahpooye Honar/Performing Arts

The Attractions of the Modern Berlin Metropolis and the Emergence of the Weimar Street film genre: A Case Study of the Street (1923)

Document Type : Original Article

Author
Assistant Professor, Faculty of Cinema and Theater, University of Art, Tehran, Iran.
Abstract
In the film studies of recent years, the relationship between cinema and the modern metropolis has been the focus of theorists. In this approach, cinema is considered as a medium emerging from the shocks and stimuli of the modern city, and the similarities between the experience of watching a movie and the urban experience are also emphasized. Weimar period Berlin is often mentioned as one of the most brilliant crystallizations of urban modernity. During this period, a new genre named "Urban Film" emerged in German cinema, and the city of Berlin was the scene of many of these works. One of the sub-branches of urban film was the "street film" genre, which is also referred to as "urban melodrama" in Weimar. In the works of this genre, the stillness, peace, and security of the home are often contrasted with the movement, chaos, and delirium of the city. The movie "The Street" (1923) by Karl Grüne is often referred to as the perfect model of the Weimar street movie genre. The film follows the pattern of melodrama, and is about crossing the moral boundaries of the house and the consequences of this transgression. This research, which has an interdisciplinary characteristic and is placed at the intersection of cinema studies and urban studies, reveals the point that the patterns shown in the film are from the experience of a man wandering among spaces. Urbanism and scattered thinking about the sights and attractions of the modern city can be matched with the patterns of watching movies.
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  • Receive Date 19 November 2022
  • Revise Date 31 January 2023
  • Accept Date 05 February 2023