M

(1931) *****

Loved, loved, loved this movie. I've used Fritz Lang's noir classic Scarlet Street sometimes to teach undergrads how to analyze and "read" film, but I'd somehow never gone back and watched this one, Lang's first talkie and the second to last movie he made before fleeing the Nazis for Hollywood.

One of the striking things for me is in contrasting this one with Caligari, which I watched and reviewed yesterday. It's amazing to see how far the medium had come in only 12 years. This one feels closer in temperament, pacing, and style to an episode of NYPD Blue than it does to the surreal expressionism of Caligari. Which isn't to say the expressionist influence isn't there--it's just not as overt as I was expecting, and this one just feels way more modern. Indeed, I've seen plenty of movies made later than 1931 that seem much less modern. This is just smart and edgy and gorgeous and completely compelling the whole way through.

The plot centers around a child murderer (Peter Lorre) and the impact his crimes have on a German city. The populace is panicked, the police are overworked and at wits end, and even the criminal syndicates are desperate, given that raids and surveilance are up all over town due to the unsolved crimes. We watch as two distinct groups (the police and the criminals, who enlist beggars) close in on the killer, ultimately bringing him to some sort of of justice.

While watching, I kept making mental notes of cool things I wanted to mention in my review, but they got too numerous to remember, so I'll just catalogue what comes to mind now.

The great opening sequence of kids playing some sort of game while chanting a morbid song about a killer coming for them in black clothes. I love morbid children's rhymes and everything they represent, so this grabbed me right away.

The first glimpse of the killer--just his shadow as leans in to talk to his victim--totally spooky and iconic. You know she's a goner right away, and it's devastating.

The cutting back and forth between the cops and criminals each conferencing in their own ways on how to solve the problem of this child murderer who is causing them so much trouble. Lang has a cop start a sentence in one place, and then cuts to a criminal holding forth and basically finishing the thought in another place. It's great structurally, and plus, I just love the whole idea of "crime syndicates."

The whole sequence in the office building where the criminals have cornered Lorre. This is where Lang begins to toy with our sympathies, as the the child killer hides in fear while the mob searches and searches. You begin to worry for his safety, against your best impulses.

And then my favorite shot in the movie, a great sweeping shot of the basement of the abandoned factory where they bring the murderer after finally grabbing him. It's a dark, wide open space, and the camera focuses on Lorre's shock when he looks up to see the faces of literally hundreds of thugs, pimps, prostitutes, burglars, and beggars staring at him. Lang pans the camera from one side to the other, and you can't help but think, "He's fucked," as the camera keeps going and going.