The Last Laugh (1924)

At the height of his career in Germany, F.W. Murnau (director of the horror classic Nosferatu) sought to create a film that would utilize only the art of cinema. The result is The Last Laugh, a film shot on carefully constructed soundstages using the "unchained cinema" technique of director of photography Karl Freund which employs flawless, gliding camera motion of a type that movies would not see again for decades after the introduction of sound. With no dialogue or narration intertitles save one, The Last Laugh communicates its story entirely through the visual language of film. Emil Jannings, one of the top actors of German silent cinema, portrays an elderly hotel doorman who is sacked from his job and subsequently finds his entire life falls apart. A tragic story of Weimar-era Germany that serves as a testament to the storytelling power of movies.

Written by Ben Rowe.