Kammerspiel And The New Objectivity

Germany is certainly among the most vital and innovative countries in the history of films of the 1920s and 1930s. In addition to being the homeland of expressionism, kammerspiel and The New Objectivity are also established, with a long series of dramas and historical movies. The kammerspiel, which means chamber acting, is a theatrical and musical avant-garde movement that also contaminates cinema, launched in the theatre in 1906 with the theatrical performance of Ibsen’s Ghosts at the Deutsches Theatre in Berlin, and which strictly respects the principle of three unity: unity of place, unity of time and unity of action. The story has as its main focus the relationship between actor and camera.

The acting is minimalist, essential, focused on making the viewer perceive even the slightest expressive nuances of faces. The locations are realistic and overwhelming: they are the visual metaphor of the characters’ condition of suffering. It includes a small number of independent films, but all of them are very interesting. They are inspired by Max Reinhardt’s experiences and they are almost written by Carl Mayer , with precise rules.

These are stories set in petty bourgeois environments, dramas of desires, grudges and threatening presences of fate. But above all, they are films shot with a total unity of action, place and space. The idea of the filmmakers is to tell exclusively through images in a totally cinematic way without the aid of captions. Kammerspiel such as Backstairs, Shattered and New Year’s Eve tell inevitable dramas caused by the human condition and the mediocrity of everyday life.

Kammerspiel: Small Daily Tragedies

These are little everyday stories that take on tragedy proportions. At the same time, historical cinema was affirmed in Germany. Inspired by the success of the German popular tradition and the Italian historical film, but with a greater capacity for staging, to move hundreds of extras and to use the sets. The director Ernst Lubitsch specialised in this genre at the beginning of his career, who later became interested in comedy especially in his trip to Hollywood, creating a unique style nicknamed Lubitsch touch .

Director Joe May specialises in another genre, a mix of genres between drama, exoticism, detective story and magic, as in the film The Indian tomb, written by Fritz Lang and his wife Thea von harbou. Fritz Lang will also make an extraordinary film, considered one of the most successful projects in the Kammerspiel, The Last Laugh , which, however, also draws on other styles and contaminations, such as expressionism.

The dramas and difficulties of metropolitan life in Berlin in the 1920s favour the success of many drama films set on city streets. The difficult world of working-class neighbourhoods, where weak people live a life of humiliation and suffering, without any possibility of redemption.

The kammerspiel and The new objectivity move in the opposite direction of expressionism and are interested in the reality of Germany of the time, but always with a strong artistic imprint of the director and his vision, without yield to objectivity as an end in itself.

The Outcasts of The City

A world of thieves, criminals, prostitutes and murderers living in the poorest neighbourhoods, but also rich bourgeois who try to change their lives and win against their frustrations without success. The expressionist style however influences this visual research on reality. The fears and anxieties of the characters on the screen are represented with visual technical solutions of great impact, with a fundamental importance of the shot.

Sometimes they are female subjects destined for failure by social laws or love disappointments. Varieté by Dupont from 1925 instead tells the drama of a former prisoner forced to suffer violence, with great expressiveness. Joe May, who had previously worked in historical dramas, also makes a film that makes the new reality of German cities particularly vividly, Asphalt from 1928.

Kammerspiel: The Films of Georg Wilhelm Pabst

Street dramas reach their best result in Pabst ‘s cinema, which manages to combine objectivity and great expressiveness in his films. The actors and the objects filmed seem to acquire a heavy, objective, corporeal, almost physical presence in his cinema. The heavy materiality of the things and people of city life acquires a singular value in Pabst, an expressive force that deforms reality in a grotesque way, thanks to the angles and light used in an innovative way. Pabst is able to alternate close-ups and close-ups, details and wider shots with a quick editing and with a unique fluidity and technical ability.

Secrets of a soul from 1926 is one of his first films, totally dedicated to psychoanalysis. But the director offers the best of his production in street dramas, recounting despair, humiliation and frustration in films such as The Joyless Street, from 1925, Lulu from 1928 and The Diary of a Lost Girl from 1925. Films that tell stories of sensuality, oppression, desire and crime. Louise Brooks gives face to a particularly suggestive character, in a story where sin and power meet to make the characters fall into temptation and evil, with images of great intensity.

The Political Kammerspiel

The most radical cinematographic experiences are linked to political and ideological projects of staging the misery of the most disadvantaged classes of the capitalist metropolises. They are more realistic films that touch the border with the documentary and try to accurately represent the condition of poverty in the popular neighbourhoods of the cities. It is a cinema of denunciation of social injustices, of class relations, which was born as a model of cinema engaged within the left-wing parties. The cinematographic experiences in the period of the Weimar Republic therefore establish very heterogeneous cinema models and visions of reality in Germany.

A current with greater strength in metaphors and symbols, which gives priority to the image and the single shot over the entire sequences and narration. The deforming and figurative expressionist cinema of Lang and Murnau. On the other hand, there is a more objective cinema that represents and describes reality with an analytical montage and a classic narrative that gives less importance to the figurative aspect of the single image. It is a cinema that tells the objective reality that will be called The New Objectivity , which also includes a more conventional and standardised genre cinema, which prefers paths and dramaturges functional to the structure of the story.

The Last Laugh

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Drama, by F.W. Murnau, Germany, 1924.
Jannings is the doorman of the Atlantic hotel in Berlin, happy with his role and his uniform. But his boss thinks he is too old to receive customers at the entrance and sets him up to clean the bathrooms. Jannings, deeply troubled by what happened, gets drunk in the evening to forget what happened and tries to hide his new degrading job from family and friends. But the next day he is discovered. Absolute masterpiece by Murnau, in balance between expressionism and kammespiel. The camera comes to life in an incredibly avant-garde style of visual experimentation.

Food for thought
For the ego, uniform and respectable work can be an absolute value. For the ego, being put to clean toilets can be the worst of humiliations. Because the ego reasons according to the opinions of others and wants us to conform to their scale of values. For our deepest selves, however, it may be more fun to clean bathrooms than to be a doorman at the hotel entrance.

LANGUAGE: German (captions)
SUBTITLES: English

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Kammerspiel Movies to Watch

Backstairs (1921)

This film marked the debut of the German director Leopold Jessner, who collaborated with Paul Leni to bring this project to life. Renowned screenwriter Carl Mayer crafted this compelling story, tailored specifically for Jessner’s visionary direction. Released in 1921, “Backstairs” emerged as a pioneering example of the German kammerspiel film style, which gained prominence throughout the 1920s for its focus on intimate and psychological narratives.The story unfolds with a waitress, portrayed by Henny Porten, beginning her routine day, diligently attending to her duties. Meanwhile, from the confines of his home, the postman, played by Fritz Kortner, watches her with a certain curiosity. As he goes about his daily task of delivering mail, he witnesses the waitress receiving a letter, which she eagerly opens and reads, stirring a subtle intrigue.The film then transports us into the night, where the intrigue deepens as the waitress encounters The Lover, a character brought to life by William Dieterle. Unbeknownst to them, the postman observes this clandestine meeting from his vantage point, adding layers of tension and voyeurism to the narrative. As the following evening arrives, the waitress ventures out once again, unaware of the postman’s persistent watchful gaze, maintaining the film’s atmosphere of suspense and underlying drama.

Shattered (1921)

“Shattered” is a 1921 German Kammerspiel silent film skillfully directed by the acclaimed Lupu Pick, with the screenplay crafted by the talented Carl Meyer. Widely recognized as the pioneering example of the kammerspielfilm genre, this cinematic piece immerses viewers in a poignant narrative set against the bleak backdrop of the harsh winter months. The story unfolds around a diligent railroad man tasked with the crucial responsibility of monitoring the railway tracks. Alongside him, his family endures a monotonous existence characterized by harsh living conditions in a dreary setting beside the railway line.Their daily life, already marred by the mundane and tedious routine, is suddenly disrupted when they receive a surprising telegram. This telegram brings momentous news: the area examiner, an important authority in the railway domain, is scheduled to pay a visit and intends to stay with the family during his assessment of the tracks. This impending visit introduces a wave of anticipation and tension into their otherwise dull lives, setting the stage for a transformative experience in their household, rich with underlying themes of social dynamics and personal aspirations.

New Year’s Eve (1921)

New Year’s Eve is a silent film from 1924, directed by the renowned German filmmaker Lupu Pick, with the screenplay crafted by Carl Meyer. Production for this cinematic piece took place in 1923, and it was first introduced to audiences in Berlin on the 4th of January in 1924. This film is heralded as one of the initial examples of a kammerspiel, a distinctive style within the silent film genre that emphasizes intimate storytelling and the psychological depth of its characters. New Year’s Eve was innovative for its time, distinguished by its groundbreaking use of cinematographic techniques. Unlike many films of the era, it employed dynamic camera movements such as panning and tracking shots, rather than relying on static framing, thus enhancing the visual narrative. True to the style of Pick’s earlier works, the film forgoes the use of intertitles, allowing the actions and expressions of its characters to convey the story without textual interruption. This approach not only reflects the artistic vision of its creators but also exemplifies the evolving language of cinema during the silent film era.

The Last Laugh (1924)

An aging, proud hotel doorman, distinguished by his magnificent uniform, is demoted to lavatory attendant when management decides he is too old for his prestigious post. Stripped of his uniform and the social identity it represents, he becomes an object of ridicule in his working-class neighborhood. F.W. Murnau‘s masterpiece follows his psychological collapse with extraordinary empathy and visual invention, relying almost entirely on images and camera movement — with virtually no intertitles — to narrate this story of modern humiliation and the cruelty of social stratification.

The Last Laugh stands as one of the supreme achievements of Weimar cinema and a perfect synthesis of Kammerspiel intimacy and New Objectivity’s sober social criticism. Murnau and cinematographer Karl Freund developed the ‘unchained camera’ technique here, liberating the lens to track, tilt, and glide with unprecedented freedom, internalizing the doorman’s subjective experience. Emil Jannings delivers a performance of extraordinary physical and emotional range, transforming a seemingly minor social demotion into a meditation on dignity, aging, and modern capitalism’s indifference to the individual. The film’s notorious satirical epilogue, tacked on by studio demand, paradoxically deepens its tragedy by exposing the fantasy of redemption. Its influence on world cinema remains incalculable.

Shards (1921)

A railway worker lives a quiet, isolated life with his wife and daughter in a remote snow-covered landscape. When a company inspector arrives seeking shelter, he begins a passionate affair with the daughter. The affair destroys the fragile equilibrium of the family, pushing the father toward a breaking point of violence and tragedy. Directed by Lupu Pick, Shards is considered one of the founding texts of the Kammerspiel movement, stripping away intertitles and relying entirely on performance, environment, and mise-en-scène to tell its devastating story.

Shards represents a radical formal intervention in early German cinema. Lupu Pick, working from a script by Carl Mayer, eliminates intertitles entirely, forcing the film to communicate through gesture, expression, and the oppressive weight of its wintry setting. This austerity aligns perfectly with the Kammerspiel philosophy: drama compressed to its barest psychological and social essentials. The film’s confined spatial world — the railway hut, the snowy tracks, the suffocating domestic interior — mirrors the psychological imprisonment of its characters. In the context of New Objectivity, Shards anticipates the movement’s disillusionment with romantic idealism, presenting human relationships as fragile structures collapsing under the pressure of desire and social isolation. It remains a foundational and bracingly modern work.

Varieté (1925)

It is a 1925 silent drama film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont based on the 1912 novel The Oath of Stephan Huller by Felix Hollaender. The trapeze scenes are set in the Wintergarten theater in Berlin. In the film, Jannings plays “Boss Huller,” a former trapeze player who was seriously injured in an accident and currently runs a seedy circus with his wife (Maly Delschaft) and their young son. Huller urges the family to hire a stranger (Lya De Putti) as a new dancer, with whom he prepares a new trapeze routine. The man falls in love with the dancer and the story ends dramatically.

Crisis (1925)

Set in post-war Vienna during a period of catastrophic inflation, this film follows the inhabitants of a single impoverished street as they struggle for survival. Among them is the daughter of a ruined civil servant who faces the constant temptation of prostitution to save her family. Directed by G.W. Pabst and featuring a luminous performance by Greta Garbo in an early role, the film draws an unsparing portrait of economic desperation and moral compromise, depicting how systemic poverty degrades human dignity and forces impossible choices upon ordinary people.

G.W. Pabst’s approach here embodies New Objectivity’s sociological gaze: the camera observes with documentary-like detachment, refusing to aestheticize suffering while simultaneously constructing a richly layered social panorama. The film moves between melodrama and social realism with fluid confidence, grounding its characters’ fates in specific material conditions — food queues, currency collapse, class exploitation. Pabst’s direction of Garbo and Asta Nielsen reveals his gift for intimate psychological portraiture within a sweeping social canvas, making this an indispensable bridge between Kammerspiel’s intimacy and New Objectivity’s broader critical ambitions.

Asphalt (1929)

Joe May, who had previously worked in historical dramas, also makes a film that renders the new reality of German cities particularly vividly, Asphalt from 1928. The film stars Gustav Fröhlich and Betty Amann and tells of a girl from Berlin who gets into trouble and steals a precious jewel. She is captured by a policeman, and the woman tries to convince him to let her go. The film was shot between October and December 1928 at the UFA.

In Berlin, a girl named Else is a beautiful con artist. Her haute couture garments and flawless makeup make her deserve to gaze at a ruby ​​as she seduces the jeweler. She is caught attempting a theft and confesses that it was her first time and that she needed the money.

Secrets of a Soul (1926)

“Secret of a Soul,” directed by Pabst in 1926, stands as one of his early cinematic endeavors and is thoroughly immersed in the realm of psychoanalysis. The narrative unfolds around Martin Fellman, an educator plagued by persistent headaches that lead him to fear he is losing his sanity. This intense anxiety and distress manifest in an overwhelming terror that he might harm his beloved partner. In a quest to quell his burgeoning fears and to confront the psychological turbulence that engulfs his mind, Martin seeks the guidance of Dr. Orth, a dedicated psychoanalyst. Together, they embark on a therapeutic journey to unravel and address the intricate layers of Martin’s psychoses, aiming to restore balance to his troubled soul. Through this exploration, the film delves deeply into the complexities of the human psyche, examining the interplay between fear, reality, and subconscious thoughts within the framework of early 20th-century psychoanalytical theory.

The Joyless Street (1925)

It is a 1925 German silent film directed by Georg Wilhelm Pabst starring Greta Garbo and Asta Nielsen. It is based on a short story by Hugo Bettauer and is considered an expression of the New Objectivity in cinema. On a street called Melchiorgasse in a bad neighborhood in 1921 Vienna, Austria, a few people’s lives collide. Marie, daughter of an abusive father, wants to leave her home with the help of her boyfriend Egon, a cashier. Grete is the eldest daughter of the poor official Rumfort. Marie and Grete wait at the butcher’s shop run by the abusive Josef Geiringer, but Grete blacks out and loses her position. Marie and her friend Else manage to get into Geiringer’s shop, where they get a piece of meat in exchange for sex.

Pandora’s Box (1929)

It is a 1929 German silent drama film directed by Georg Wilhelm Pabst and starring Louise Brooks, Fritz Kortner and Francis Lederer. The film is about Lulu, a sexy girl whose spontaneous nature creates problems for herself and those who like her. It is based on Frank Wedekind‘s plays Erdgeist (1895) and Die Büchse der Pandora (1904). Snubbed by critics upon its initial release, the film was later discovered by film scholars as a classic of Weimar German cinema.

Lulu is the girlfriend of a respected middle-aged newspaper author, Dr. Ludwig Schön. One day an old man, his “first client”, Schigolch, shows up at the door of his house. When Schön also arrives, he has Schigolch hide on the terrace. Schön breaks the news to Lulu that he will most likely marry Charlotte von Zarnikow, the daughter of the Minister of the Interior.

Diary of a Lost Girl (1929)

It is a 1929 German silent film directed by GW Pabst and starring American actress Louise Brooks. There are 2 versions of the film: from 79 minutes to 116 minutes. This was Brooks’ last and second film with Pabst and, like their previous collaboration Lulu, is considered a classic film. It is based on Margarete Böhme’s bestselling 1905 novel of the same name. The book had previously been adapted by Richard Oswald.

Thymian Henning, pharmacologist Robert Henning’s naïve little girl, is perplexed when their caretaker, Elisabeth, leaves suddenly on the day of the little girl’s confirmation. It turns out that her father got Elisabeth pregnant. Elisabeth’s body is taken to the pharmacy later that day, an obvious suicide, and the event causes Thymian anguish.

Thymian’s father’s aide Meinert ensures to clear everything up for her late that night, but instead rapes her while she is unconscious and she too becomes pregnant. Thymian refuses to recognize the child’s father, her relatives find out from her diary and decide that the best thing is for her to marry Meinert. When she refuses they give the baby to a midwife and send her to a prison for troubled women run by an overbearing woman and her aide.

People on Sunday (1930)

A semi-documentary silent film following four young Berliners — a wine merchant, a film extra, a taxi driver, and a model — over a single Sunday as they escape the city for a lakeside outing. Flirtations develop, minor tensions arise, and the day ends with quiet anticlimax. Directed by Robert Siodmak and Edgar G. Ulmer from a script by Billy Wilder and Curt Siodmak, the film used non-professional actors and location shooting to capture Berlin’s working-class leisure culture with candid, unposed naturalism, creating a unique document of Weimar-era everyday life.

People on Sunday is one of the most remarkable films to emerge from the Weimar period, and its relationship to New Objectivity is direct and profound. The film’s use of real locations, non-actors, and observational camera work translates the aesthetic program of the Neue Sachlichkeit visual arts directly into cinematic language. There is no dramatic plot in the conventional sense — only the texture of lived experience, captured with affectionate precision. Its attention to the small rituals of working-class Sunday leisure, the body language of courtship, the transience of pleasure, embodies New Objectivity’s commitment to depicting contemporary reality without idealization or expressionist distortion. A crucial transitional work, it bridges silent Kammerspiel intimacy with the emerging tradition of Italian neorealism and the French New Wave.