The Final Accord (1936) by Douglas Sirk
Sunday, March 6, 1983, 8:00 pm
Douglas Sirk
Part I
The Final Accord (1936), 98 min. Two programs are being devoted to the finest German-language films by one of the greatest directors (Written on the Wind), their first public showings in San Francisco.
“Take nothing for granted in Sirk. Every camera movement, every slice of decor, contains a thought Sirk is unique among narrative filmmakers and 50 years ahead of his time with his structuralist’s concerns, in his play of the tensions arising between the disparity of the two-dimensional reality of the flat surface of the screen image versus the illusion (delusion?) of three-dimensional actuality of life that pictorialism is trying to convey. Hence his emphasis on mirrors, surfaces, etc., the constant breaking up of the imagic mise-en-scene, his visual qualifications and shattering of the codes.’’ —Warren Sonbert.