Cabinet of Caligari

Released May 25, 1962

1 hr. 45 min.

Horror

List

Reviews

31%

100+ Ratings

Audience Score

When Jane Lindstrom (Glynis Johns) has car trouble, she seeks help at a nearby mansion. The owner, Caligari (Dan O'Herlihy), invites her to stay the night, but he proves to be a bizarre host as he begins questioning her about her sex life, showing her pornography and peeping on her in the bath. The next morning, she realizes that she is being held against her will, but her entreaties for help from Caligari's other guests go strangely unheeded. Was it really car trouble that brought her here?

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Stephen W

I was surprised as to how good this is, a lovely intrigueing strange mystery!

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

03/10/24

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nick s

The production quality of the film was fine, but it was too drawn out... especially if you guess the plot early. I was bored.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

02/16/24

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Steve D

Some interesting twists but it never quite works as a whole.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

07/18/23

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Audience Member

Blobbo not understand low rating. Movie pretty good representation of paranoid schizophrenia from patient point view. OOPS - BLOBBO REVIEW GIVE AWAY SURPRISE ENDING!

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

01/17/23

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Audience Member

The differences between this movie and its silent film inspiration are significant. Here Caligari is a controlling Freudian madman,Â keeping Jane against her will and taunting her with scarcely glimpsed perversities.Â Kay and Bloch do away with the somnambulistÂ CesarÂ and the carnival setting, focusing instead on the implications of the earlier film's ending. But while the majority of the action seems much moreÂ "real world"than in Weine's film, the climax in which Jane descends fully into madness is a real stunner. One particular sequence in whichÂ Jane sees a baker pulling loaves of bread shaped like infants out of a blazing ovenÂ even seems to prefigure David Lynch'sÂ EraserheadÂ in both theme and imagery--in fact, I would not be surprised to learn this film was a direct influence on that one.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

02/06/23

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Audience Member

A strange tale that is a long wind up to a final twist ending of the Twilight Zone sort. Impressive acting by an ensemble cast but with a script filled with quite pretentious and stilted dialog. Horror is something of an overstatement in describing this movie. If you are expecting a remake of the 1920 silent classic, this is definitely not it. What it really is the viewer only learns at the end, at which point a lot of pretentious dialog makes more sense than it seemed to when you initially heard it.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

02/13/23

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Roger Kay

Director

Glynis Johns

Jane Lindstrom

Dan O'Herlihy

Caligari

Richard Davalos

Mark Lindstrom

Larry Dobkin

Dr. Frank David

Constance Ford

Christine

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Chris Alexander

Alexander On Film

The film serves as an ultra-sexualized exercise in pop-psychology and increasingly bizarre, hallucinatory exchanges of dialogue.

Mar 30, 2022

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Dwight MacDonald

Esquire Magazine

Its flatly realistic style is not appropriate to the subject and the snatches of arty camera work the director throws in when he thinks of it merely add to the confusion.

Aug 1, 2019

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Michael Szymanski

Hollywood.com

It's very creepy...

Rated: 4/5

Oct 15, 2005

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Synopsis

When Jane Lindstrom (Glynis Johns) has car trouble, she seeks help at a nearby mansion. The owner, Caligari (Dan O'Herlihy), invites her to stay the night, but he proves to be a bizarre host as he begins questioning her about her sex life, showing her pornography and peeping on her in the bath. The next morning, she realizes that she is being held against her will, but her entreaties for help from Caligari's other guests go strangely unheeded. Was it really car trouble that brought her here?

Director: Roger Kay
Executive Producer: Robert L. Lippert
Screenwriter: Robert Bloch
Distributor: 20th Century Fox
Genre: Horror
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): May 25, 1962, Original
Release Date (DVD): Sep 6, 2005