News | Paris, 09/28/2015

Bertelsmann Brings Restored Film Classic ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari’ to Paris

Robert Wiene’s 1920 masterpiece will be screened at the new Paris Philharmonic in the lead-up to the ‘Festival du Cinéma Allemand’

Bertelsmann brings the digitally restored version of Robert Wiene’s 1920 silent movie classic “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” to Paris. The expressionist masterpiece from the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation’s collection will be screened on October 5, 2015 in the great hall of the new Paris Philharmonic, ahead of the 20th “Festival du Cinéma Allemand.” The film music will be played by the Orchestre National d'Ile de France, conducted by Timothy Brock. Germany’s new ambassador to France, Nikolaus Meyer-Landrut, is the patron of the Caligari screening. 

The international media, services and education company Bertelsmann has a special relationship to the film: it is the parent company of Germany’s largest film production company UFA, of whose historical legacy "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" is a part, and the main sponsor of the restoration of this cinematic jewel by the Murnau Foundation. As a company that regards creativity as a central value of its corporate culture, Bertelsmann champions, on many levels, the conservation and preservation of important cultural assets – including our cinematic heritage, which is threatened by decay. 

Bertelsmann Chairman & CEO Thomas Rabe said: “Silent films are becoming increasingly popular and continue to inspire filmmakers to this day. And yet, many of the now almost century-old works threaten to decay if they are not quickly restored. Bertelsmann cares about preserving films like ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari’ and making them accessible for today's audiences. That is why we get involved in restorations and film presentations, such as this one here in Paris or the UFA Film Nights in Berlin and Brussels." 

The restoration of “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” funded by Bertelsmann took almost two years, culminating in the world premiere of the completely revamped movie at the Berlinale in February 2014. The Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation, which curates a significant part of Germany’s cinematic heritage, was able to use the Federal Film Archive’s almost completely preserved camera negative for the first time, for unprecedented quality in the restored version. Thanks to various distribution and archive copies from the 1920s and ‘30s, the film about sinister Dr. Caligari and his sleepwalking psychic Cesare is now more complete than ever before. Frame jumps and missing images were fixed with meticulous attention to detail. The digital restoration also allowed for a more convincing reproduction of the historical coloring and expressionist intertitles than in previous versions. 

More information and pictures can be found in a special section of the Bertelsmann website, at http://www.bertelsmann.com/news-and-media/specials/the-cabinet-of-dr.-caligari/  

About Bertelsmann

Bertelsmann is a media, services and education company that operates in about 50 countries around the world. It includes the broadcaster RTL Group, the trade book publisher Penguin Random House, the magazine publisher Gruner + Jahr, the service providers Arvato and Be Printers, the music company BMG and the Bertelsmann Education Group. The company has more than 112,000 employees and generated revenues of €16.7 billion in financial year 2014. Bertelsmann stands for creativity and entrepreneurship. This combination promotes the creation of first-class media content and innovative service solutions that inspire customers around the world. 

For further questions, please contact: 

Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA
Susanne Erdl
Vice President Media Relations
Phone: +49 – 52 41 / 80 42 629