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Sunday 27 May 2012

The Spectator’s 50 Essential Films: Part Two

Peter Hoskin and Matthew d’Ancona count down the final 25 of The Spectator’s 50 Essential Films

3.
Sunrise
(F.W. Murnau, 1928)

The subtitle to Sunrise informs us that it’s A Song of Two Humans — and how magnificently that song is sung. Murnau uses every trick available to him to embellish this fable about the estrangement, and eventual reconciliation, of a man (George O’Brien) and his wife (Janet Gaynor). The camera whirls, images are superimposed on top of one another, sets burst with detail. But nothing is superfluous: every careful shot expresses something crucial, something wondrous, about the inner desires and motivations of the characters. It both demands and repays close attention.

I’ve always thought that a public-spirited art gallery would do well to screen Sunrise on loop, at one or two frames a minute. It would be an easy sell: just call it ‘The Most Beautiful, Most Profound Slide-Show in the World’. PH

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