Typically of the chronological jumble of my film-watching life, I saw the second part of Fritz Lang's 1923-24 epic "Die Nibelung" first. I saw "Kriemhild's Revenge" screened at the East Lansing Public Library when I was an undergraduate and never forgot the scene of naked children dancing around a tree as warriors of Attila the Hun passed by. Along with Dreyer's "Passion of Joan of Arc," "Kriemhild's Revenge" contained the most intense emotional performance I've ever seen. As the martyr, Falconetti suffered ecstatically for Dreyer's camera. The widowed Kriemhild Margarete Schoen portrayed conveyed great grief and implacable hatred.

I eventually saw the first part, "Siegfried," which developed screen magic but hews closer to Richard Wagner's adaptation of the medieval Teutonic myth of the triumphs and cutting down of the heroic warrior/lover Siegfried (Paul Richter) who (trained by a troll) forges a magic sword, rides around naked above the waist on his gleaming white steed, finds and slays the dragon that guards the gold, bathes in the dragon's blood to gain invulnerability (except where there was a leaf...), woos and wins the warrior queen Kriemhild, and is murdered by the courtiers of King (of Burgundy) Gunther (Theodor Loos), who is Siegfried's brother-in-law and and sworn blood-brother, and owes his own bride, Brunhilde of Iceland to Siegfried's ruses and prowess. The vacillating king is pressed to eliminate Siegfried by their near-giant uncle Hagen (Hans Adalbert Schlettow).

Perhaps encouraged by the mega-success of "The Lord of the Rings," a restored print of this greatest of silent-movie fantasy epics appeared on DVD two years ago. I had to have it, but did not feel the need to post an epinion about it given that JediKermit had written discerning and extensive accounts of both parts (at http://www.epinions.com/mvie_mu-1044213 and http://www.epinions.com/content_42893414020). What I have to add is information about and praise for the two-disk DVD.

I was especially fascinated by the footage of Lang at work (though Godard's "Contempt" shows Lang directed the Odyssey, so in some sense I had seen Lang directing). The Kino DVD presents restoration work done by the Munich Film Museum adds 100 minutes to the running time of previous US releases and features a soundtrack of Gottfried Huppertz's original score recorded by the Munich Radio Orchestra.

On their theatrical release, "silent films" were never silent. (In contrast, there is genuine silence in Sergio Leone westerns, memorable as their Ennio "Morricone soundtracks are.) Whether because my first viewings of "Nibelung" lacked music, because the restored movie runs much longer, because I've already seen both parts, or because I'm older and more skeptical of monomanias of all sorts, I was not as awestruck watching "Nibelung" on DVD. Kriemhild's hatred is still amazing and awe-inspiring, but now seems more frightening to me. Aided by her surprisingly considerate husband Attila, she has her vengeance, destroying her own native land and slaying her natal family

Scripted by Lang's then-wife, Thea von Harbou (as "Destiny" was, "M" and "Metropolis" would be), the 291-minute two parts put up vivid images of light filtering down to the forest floor, darkness in castles, the Northern Lights (in Siegfried's sojourn to Iceland to win Brunhilde for Gunther), and a 60-foot-long dragon that was astounding at the time and remains fairly impressive breathing fire and bleeding copiously when Siegfried stabs it.

DVD bonus features include rare footage of Fritz Lang on the set, Production design and special effects sketches by Erich Ketthelhut (intercut with scenes from the films), a photo gallery of the production, comparison of the dragon-slaying scenes from "Siegfried" and from Douglas Fairbanks's "Thief of Baghdad," and a still-frame essay by film historian Jan-Christopher Horak.


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This a belated contribution to StPatrick's Silence is Golden" writeoff, as well as part of Lean 'n Mean III. Reviews of more Lang movies are on the way...

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD