The surviving masterpiece of German expressionist horror. In 16th
century Prague, Rabbi Loew (Albert Steinrück) sculpts a giant of
clay and brings it to life with a magic word to defend the ghetto
from an imperial decree of expulsion — but the Golem (Paul Wegener,
who co-directed with Carl Boese) will not remain a servant. The
staggered Expressionist sets, built like crooked clay houses, and
the creation sequence's Kabbalistic ritual became templates for
Frankenstein and every creature feature after. This was Wegener's
third Golem film and the only one to survive substantially intact.
A century on, it remains genuinely uncanny. Published in 1920, it is
in the public domain in the United States.
Horror · Fantasy · Silent
