![]() ![]() Waxworks is an anthology film that is framed by the story of a writer/poet (William Dieterle) who heads to a funfair, replying to a newspaper advert looking for a talented author to come up with imaginative stories to accompany the main exhibits in a wax museum. I picked up a screener to see how it matched up to his later work. Some have even suggested the final portion of the film helped pave the way for the slasher movie, with its relentless, soulless, silent, murderous villain.Īfter greatly admiring The Man Who Laughed when reviewing Eureka’s recent Blu-ray release of the film, I was thrilled to hear the label were next setting their sights on Waxworks. Its style and techniques are believed to have inspired a wide range of films, such as Eisenstein’s Ivan the Terrible, Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933) The Scarlet Empress (1934), The Wizard of Oz (1939), Dead of Night (1945), House of Wax (1953) and Black Sabbath (1963). On top of leading Leni to fame and fortune in the US, Waxworks was a highly regarded late entry into the German Expressionist movement. Leni’s career in Hollywood was very successful too, whilst it lasted, bringing the popular and highly regarded The Cat and the Canary (1927) and The Man Who Laughed (1928) before his untimely death in 1929, aged 44. It helped get him noticed in the industry as a director and was likely the major factor that got him headhunted by Universal’s Carl Laemmle. He began directing his own films in 1917, but 1924’s Waxworks was his first major box-office success. Paul Leni’s film career began in art direction and production design on a number of films, including some for Lubitsch, Alexander Korda and Mikhail Kertész (a.k.a. Starring: Emil Jannings, Conrad Veidt, Werner Krauss, William Dieterle, Olga Belajeff, John Gottowt ![]() Directors: Paul Leni, Leo Birinsky (exact contribution unclear)
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