In this class we will devote our attention to one film, a gem from the Golden Age of German cinema, Pandora’s Box (1929), and explore the enigmatic screen presence of its magnetic star, Louise Brooks. Along the way, we’ll explore the classical myth of Pandora, the Golden Age of German cinema, Hollywood, the heady and decadent days of the Weimar Republic, modernism, sexuality, violence, innocence and, of course, the star of the film, Louise Brooks as Lulu. In Louise Brooks – a flapper from Kansas, Ziegfeld Follies dancer, and budding film star who ditched Hollywood for Berlin – the director G. W. Pabst found the embodiment of the femme fatale, Lulu, an originally Teutonic character in the fin de siècle plays of Frank Wedekind. In Pabst, Brooks found the director who immortalized her inscrutable screen presence – an ineffable charisma that still thrills first-time viewers.

As David Thomson, the British film critic, wrote of Brooks: “One of the most mysterious and potent figures in the history of the cinema … she was one of the first performers to penetrate to the heart of screen acting.” Or, as Henri Langlois, founder of the film archive Cinémathèque Française exclaimed: “There is no Garbo. There is no Dietrich. There is only Louise Brooks.” Intensely modern and surprisingly shocking even today, Pandora’s Box is a masterpiece from the silent era that deserves more attention. Come discover Lulu as she opens that fabled box and (innocently?) lets loose upon those in the world around her.