The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari with new score by Hayim Kobi January 30, 2006

Lowbudget Records is proud to present our version of "The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari", a film which many have heard of but few have actually seen. Our version is different from any other version in that we have replaced the long-winded title cards with subtitles, thereby quickening the pace of the film. We've also done some frame-blending in scenes where missing frames made the action suddenly jerk, and we've added various fade-outs and crossfades to give the film a more traditional flow. And, of course, our version boasts what we consider to be the best soundtrack available for this title, composed by Hayim Kobi.

Why would we want to edit this film? To paraphrase the late film historian William K. Everson, films that were once considered "masterpieces" sometimes end up simply as "milestones", depending on the times. For every film student who sat mesmerized at a 16mm print of "Caligari" in a college auditorium, there were 49 who were falling asleep. Blame can be partially attributed to lousy washed out prints that are difficult to watch, but a lot of it can be attributed to the film itself. In 1919, it was rare to see a feature film that moved along at a brisk pace, and Caligari sometimes slowed down more than most. What we've attempted to do is to try and allow the viewer to focus on the stunning film itself and not on the lengthy title cards. To give you an idea of how many title cards there were, we trimmed a 75 minute film down to 61 minutes - about 1/5 of the film had been titles. Though the changes we've introduced to the film aren't as extreme as those in our version of "Nosferatu", we feel that we've made a version of "Caligari" that finally begs for repeated viewing.

Zeitgeist Gallery $8