Avant-garde films of the '20ies
by AMNascinski | created - 10 Oct 2013 | updated - 10 Oct 2013 | Public- Instant Watch Options
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1. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
Not Rated | 67 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Hypnotist Dr. Caligari uses a somnambulist, Cesare, to commit murders.
Director: Robert Wiene | Stars: Werner Krauss, Conrad Veidt, Friedrich Feher, Lil Dagover
Votes: 70,101
2. Nosferatu (1922)
Not Rated | 94 min | Fantasy, Horror
Vampire Count Orlok expresses interest in a new residence and real estate agent Hutter's wife.
Director: F.W. Murnau | Stars: Max Schreck, Alexander Granach, Gustav von Wangenheim, Greta Schröder
Votes: 105,518
3. Faust (1926)
Not Rated | 107 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
The demon Mephisto wagers with God that he can corrupt a mortal man's soul.
Director: F.W. Murnau | Stars: Gösta Ekman, Emil Jannings, Camilla Horn, Frida Richard
Votes: 16,641
4. Metropolis (1927)
Not Rated | 153 min | Drama, Sci-Fi
In a futuristic city sharply divided between the working class and the city planners, the son of the city's mastermind falls in love with a working-class prophet who predicts the coming of a savior to mediate their differences.
Director: Fritz Lang | Stars: Brigitte Helm, Alfred Abel, Gustav Fröhlich, Rudolf Klein-Rogge
Votes: 185,637 | Gross: $1.24M
5. Destiny (1921)
Not Rated | 114 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
When a woman's fiancé disappears, Death gives her three chances to save him from his fate.
Director: Fritz Lang | Stars: Bernhard Goetzke, Lil Dagover, Walter Janssen, Hans Sternberg
Votes: 6,696 | Gross: $0.01M
6. Die Nibelungen: Siegfried (1924)
Not Rated | 100 min | Adventure, Drama, Fantasy
Siegfried, son of King Siegmund of Xanten, sets off on a treacherous journey to the Kingdom of Burgundy to ask King Gunther for the hand of his sister, the beautiful Princess Kriemhild.
Director: Fritz Lang | Stars: Paul Richter, Margarete Schön, Theodor Loos, Gertrud Arnold
Votes: 6,560
7. The Woman from Nowhere (1922)
61 min | Drama
A woman appears at the house where she used to live a long time ago. The new inhabitants, a married couple with a toddler, welcome her to stay for the night. Meanwhile, the wife has to choose between family and adventure.
Director: Louis Delluc | Stars: Ève Francis, Gine Avril, Noémi Seize, Denise
Votes: 283
8. L'inondation (1924)
77 min | Drama
After the death of her mother, Germaine moves in with her father in a small town near the Rhône river. She falls in love with a young man, Alban, already engaged.
Director: Louis Delluc | Stars: Ève Francis, Edmond Van Daële, Philippe Hériat, Ginette Maddie
Votes: 71
9. La fête espagnole (1920)
67 min | Drama
Coveted by two different men, a woman turns to a third man instead.
Director: Germaine Dulac | Stars: Ève Francis, Gabriel Gabrio, Jean Toulout, Gaston Modot
Votes: 33
10. The Smiling Madame Beudet (1923)
26 min | Short, Drama
An unhappily married woman devises a scheme to get rid of her husband.
Director: Germaine Dulac | Stars: Germaine Dermoz, Madeleine Guitty, Jean d'Yd, Yvette Grisier
Votes: 2,949
11. La belle Nivernaise (1924)
69 min | Drama
Bargeman Louveau finds an abandoned boy, Victor, and with the authorities permission takes him back to his own family where he raises him. 10 years later Victor and Louveau's daughter Clara... See full summary »
Director: Jean Epstein | Stars: Blanche Montel, Marie Lacroix, Maurice Touzé, Pierre Hot
Votes: 149
12. La glace à trois faces (1927)
45 min | Drama, Romance
Psychological narrative avantgarde film about a wealthy young businessman who consecutively falls in love with a classy English woman (Pearl), a Russian sculptress (Athalia), and a naive ... See full summary »
Director: Jean Epstein | Stars: Jeanne Helbling, Suzy Pierson, Olga Day, Raymond Guérin-Catelain
Votes: 966
13. The Fall of the House of Usher (1928)
Not Rated | 72 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
Allan visits the sinister Usher family mansion, where his friend Roderick is painting a portrait of his sickly wife Madeline. The portrait seems to be draining the life out of Madeline, slowly leading to her death.
Director: Jean Epstein | Stars: Jean Debucourt, Marguerite Gance, Charles Lamy, Fournez-Goffard
Votes: 4,504
14. Misdeal (1928)
102 min | Drama, Romance
Maldone is a canal worker, happy with his life after running away from his family estate. He falls in love with Zita, a young gypsy girl, during a local fete. However, after his brother ... See full summary »
Director: Jean Grémillon | Stars: Charles Dullin, Marcelle Charles Dullin, Geymond Vital, André Bacqué
Votes: 242
15. L'inhumaine (1924)
Not Rated | 135 min | Drama, Mystery, Romance
Claire Lescot is a famous first lady. All men want to be loved by her and among them is the young scientist Einar Norsen. When she mocks at him, he leaves her house with the declared intention to kill himself.
Director: Marcel L'Herbier | Stars: Jaque Catelain, Léonid Walter de Malte, Philippe Hériat, Fred Kellerman
Votes: 1,040
16. L'Argent (1928)
195 min | Drama, Romance
The business tycoon Nicolas Saccard is nearly ruined by his rival Gunderman, when he tries to raise capital for his company. To push up the price of his stock, Saccard plans a publicity ... See full summary »
Director: Marcel L'Herbier | Stars: Brigitte Helm, Marie Glory, Pierre Alcover, Yvette Guilbert
Votes: 1,155
17. Napoleon (1927)
330 min | Biography, Drama, History
A film about the French general's youth and early military career.
Director: Abel Gance | Stars: Albert Dieudonné, Vladimir Roudenko, Edmond Van Daële, Alexandre Koubitzky
Votes: 8,800
18. The Seashell and the Clergyman (1928)
40 min | Short, Drama, Fantasy
Obsessed with a general's woman, a clergyman has strange visions of death and lust, struggling against his own eroticism.
Director: Germaine Dulac | Stars: Alex Allin, Lucien Bataille, Genica Athanasiou
Votes: 2,287
19. Un chien andalou (1929)
Not Rated | 16 min | Short, Fantasy, Horror
Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dalí present 16 minutes of bizarre, surreal imagery.
Director: Luis Buñuel | Stars: Pierre Batcheff, Simone Mareuil, Luis Buñuel, Pancho Cossío
Votes: 53,823
20. L'Age d'Or (1930)
Not Rated | 63 min | Comedy, Drama
A surrealist tale of a man and a woman who are passionately in love with each other, but their attempts to consummate that passion are constantly thwarted by their families, the Church, and bourgeois society.
Director: Luis Buñuel | Stars: Gaston Modot, Lya Lys, Caridad de Laberdesque, Max Ernst
Votes: 14,818 | Gross: $0.03M
21. The Blood of a Poet (1932)
Not Rated | 55 min | Fantasy
Told in four episodes - an unnamed artist is transported through a mirror into another dimension, where he travels through various bizarre scenarios.
Director: Jean Cocteau | Stars: Enrique Rivero, Elizabeth Lee Miller, Pauline Carton, Odette Talazac
Votes: 7,372
22. Battleship Potemkin (1925)
Not Rated | 66 min | Drama, History, Thriller
In the midst of the Russian Revolution of 1905, the crew of the battleship Potemkin mutiny against the brutal, tyrannical regime of the vessel's officers. The resulting street demonstration in Odessa brings on a police massacre.
Director: Sergei Eisenstein | Stars: Aleksandr Antonov, Vladimir Barskiy, Grigoriy Aleksandrov, Ivan Bobrov
Votes: 61,476 | Gross: $0.05M
23. October (Ten Days that Shook the World) (1927)
95 min | Drama, History
A large-scale view on the events of 1917 in Russia, when the monarchy was overthrown.
Directors: Grigoriy Aleksandrov, Sergei Eisenstein | Stars: Boris Livanov, Nikolay Popov, Vasili Nikandrov, Layaschenko
Votes: 8,454
24. Old and New (1929)
Not Rated | 121 min | Drama
100.000.000 peasants - illiterate, poor, hungry. There comes a day when one woman decides that she can live old life no longer. Using ways of new Soviet state and industrial progress she changes life and labor of her village.
Directors: Grigoriy Aleksandrov, Sergei Eisenstein | Stars: Marfa Lapkina, M. Ivanin, Konstantin Vasilyev, Vasili Buzenkov
Votes: 1,726
25. Man with a Movie Camera (1929)
Not Rated | 68 min | Documentary
A man travels around a city with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling invention.
Director: Dziga Vertov | Stars: Mikhail Kaufman, Elizaveta Svilova
Votes: 28,007
26. Mother (1926)
Not Rated | 89 min | Drama
A story about a family torn apart by a worker's strike. At first, the mother wants to protect her family from the troublemakers, but eventually she realizes that her son is right and the workers should strike.
Director: Vsevolod Pudovkin | Stars: Vera Baranovskaya, Nikolay Batalov, Aleksandr Chistyakov, Anna Zemtsova
Votes: 3,070
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