Is it ever possible to be satisfied with what one has, or is the pursuit of the greener grass an innate human characteristic? Is there actually greener grass on the other side (the other side of what? – insert your own imaginary divider between where you are and where you think you should be)? The answer has to be ‘maybe’. We can never know what life has in store; even those professing to be ‘masters of their own destiny’ cannot precisely know how events will unfold. And often, what exists directly before us is the source of whatever happiness and purpose we find in life. These questions and sentiment are central in Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans.

The Movie

A silent film from 1927 by F.W. Murnau (Nosferatu), Sunrise sits at number eighty-two on AFI’s Top 100 Movies. In 2020, with all its noise and hyperbole, watching a silent movie is not typically one of my primary evening activities, and Sunrise sat unwatched in my queue for weeks, slowing my progress through AFI’s canonical list. Now, having watched the film, I can appreciate the themes and artistry Sunrise embodied in 1927 and recognize many films today are simply pulpy fodder existing solely to satisfy the ravenous demand for new content where film is a money generator before an art form.

The Story and The People

The story launches under dark auspices. ‘The Man’, the male lead, has fallen out of love with his wife, ‘The Wife’, and been seduced by ‘The Woman From the City’, sending his family’s welfare toward ruin while dreaming of a romantic and exciting life elsewhere. The plot thickens when ‘The Woman From the City’ proposes ‘The Man’ end his marriage by drowning his wife. This accelerates the story into motion. Can ‘The Man’ really extinguish the innocent, loving brightness exuding from his wife? There is a dialogue intertitle conveying ‘The Man’ and ‘The Wife’ were, in fact, deeply in love at one point and spent their days in carefree bliss, so there undoubtedly will be internal conflict. Determining which grass is greener is the propellant that fuels the entire movie, establishing the tenseness of conflict and the emotional investment that makes loss painful. There is no subtlety or nuance in the arc Sunrise follows, and that is beautiful for a silent film; viewers will never have doubt around what the characters are experiencing. You can spend your focus experiencing the journey rather than making sense of the events.

The Art

In modern movies, set pieces have seemingly endless capacity and depth because they can be generated by a computer. Filmmaking in 1927 certainly had to require imagination and the creativity to bring those machinations to life. Sunrise exhibits an immersive cinematographic experience that gives each setting depth and pliability. The world is appropriately small and limited to the characters’ immediate surroundings; the characters are the focus of one another, and the periphery cannot penetrate their relationship. Yet, each setting provides a tease. What is in the next room? What exists around the bend in the road? How big is that body of water? These questions are not answered, and you are forced to ignite your imagination to fill in the blanks. Where the city feels populated and frantic, traversing the film’s focal body of water feels equally isolating. The viewers’ minds can craft whatever perception they desire, but the shot construction and framing does what it can to steer viewers to an appropriate interpretation. Sunrise is beautiful and crisp, drawing everything it can out of 1927 black-and-white film fidelity.

Finis

I am not going to regularly seek silent movies to fill my time. Sunrise, however, was a worthwhile watch and provided a coherent, understandable experience. There was no issue deciphering actions or emotions, and because of that, I was able to draw more from the film than expected. While the story may be a common tale by today’s standards, it is still a valuably reflective message that validates the richness of the Top 100 content.