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Berlin: The Modern City

By: Dennis Coleman

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1. Introduction
The key concern of this paper is to make analytical speculation over two films and to discover the use of various elements, in order to fit into New Objectivity genre. The two films that are selected for his purpose are Berlin: Symphony of a Great City of 1927 by Walter Ruthman and People on Sunday of 1929 by Robert Siodmak. The approach leads the paper towards the recognition of new objectivity in these films, with reference to the representation of modern Berlin. The paper compares the two films and analyzes the recurring motifs and the visual languages used in these films. It also interprets the image of cinematic city within the specialized context of politics, cultural discourses and above all aspects related to the ideological debates in Weimar Republic (Hake, 2008).

2. New Objectivity in Films
The concept of New Objectivity has been identified as a ‘new matter-of-factness’. It developed as an art form in Germany during the years of 1920s. The zeal to explore new matters on the basis of fact outgrew in opposition to the movement of expressionism. Being a movement post-expressionist, new objectivity gets applied to all those works related to pictorial art, music, literature, architecture and films. The core concern of new objectivity is to describe stripped-down and very much simplified building style led in the Bauhaus and the process of Weissenh of Settlement. It is integral to the structure of urban planning added by policies and formatting of public housing projects. As explained by Hartlaub, new objectivity is ‘what we are displaying here is distinguished in itself is purely external; and the characteristics of the objectivity with which the artists express themselves’. It is all about expressing a content from the objective point of view rather than subjective. This is the reason that the productions made under the genre of new objectivity were more about scenes collected objectively. The approaches of new objectivity are from cool to cold and are often selected under thin layers of impressive colors. For motion pictures these colors are represented by the emotional shades of human psychology (Kracauer, 1974). Being smooth and dislodged from the contemporary social structure, they are well transcribed through films like Berlin: Symphony of a Great City and People on Sunday.
In terms of films the application of new objectivity is related to the depiction of a concept by means of pictorial representations. The approach led in films is very strong and were in absolute contrast to the extravagant expressionism. It dealt with strong sense of social realities added by the contrasts of expressing context in a new way. This is a proceeding that draws the characteristic feature of Soviet cinema into the genre of being inspirational. With the element of new objectivity there was an adoption that intermixed montage of all the Russian filmmakers with by depicting story through camera movements (Isenberg, 2008). This was further elaborated through extended tracking of realistic vision collected from different social strata and dimensions of time. This is a typical kind of approach that differed Soviet cinema from its Expressionistic mode. The new approach was more rhythmic and there was more room for expressive internal states (Kaes, et al 1994). New objectivity is thus a precise mode of declaring objectives on socio-political context, yet is standing outside the basic objective of related observations and records.

3. Elements of New Objectivity in Berlin: Symphony of a Great City
Berlin: Symphony of a Great City is a German silent film that has been directed by Walter Ruttmann. It was co-written by Carl Mayer and his contemporary Karl Freund. The film is a typical example to symphony genre as it has got enough musical scores. It has been recognized as a "city symphony" film that has excelled in portraying life of a city that is Berlin. The approach has been led specifically through visual impressions led by semi-documentary style. There is basically no narrative content of like any other mainstream films. However there is a continuous sequencing various events which also can be implied as "narrative" related to the incidents of the city's daily life.
Depiction of Berlin has been forwarded for understanding the socialist political structure under the reflection of being sympathized. There is an identification made with the underclass. Instead of showing Berlin as a country of controversies, Ruttmann pursued the aesthetic interests of the city and extended it to diminish potential political content. Ruttmann approached the film with excessive stress over all kinds of aesthetic notions. The declarations are related to the illustration and description of Berlin from a day to day picturisation.

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