Edgar G. Ulmer

Bernd Herzogenrath teaches American literature and culture at the University of Frankfurt and the University of Cologne in Germany. He is also the editor of The Films of Tod Browning: Essays on the Macabre and Grotesque (McFarland 2008).

“Herzogenrath...has a real affection for his subject”—Little Shoppe of Horrors; “A terrific director who honed his chops on German Expressionism and economic necessity, the legendary Edgar G. Ulmer set up aesthetic shop making six-day wonders in the cinema’s lower depths. Ulmerian mise-en-scène is synonymous with problem solving—and vice versa. No filmmaker ever demonstrated a more formidable capacity for making something from nothing and Bernd Herzogenrath’s anthology pays belated, serious tribute to his genius.”—J. Hoberman, film critic and author of Bridge of Light: Yiddish Film between Two Worlds, and co-author of Midnight Movies; “At last, here is a scholarly book in English about one of the key figures of low-budget and marginal cinema who has most eluded scholarship. Bernd Herzogenrath’s fascinating collection not only clarifies many particulars about the life, career, and art of Ulmer (including his birthplace); it also proposes some new and more fruitful routes we might take in understanding them.”—Jonathan Rosenbaum, author of Discovering Orson Welles, and co-author of Midnight Movies.

• Table of ContentsForeword by Arianné Ulmer Cipes      Introduction: The Return of Edgar G. UlmerBERND HERZOGENRATH      Ulmer and Cult/ureBERND HERZOGENRATH      Camera Obscura, or Moments of Broken Economy in Edgar G. Ulmer’s FilmsSTEFAN GRISSEMANN      The Ordinary Life of Ordinary People: Menschen am SonntagPETRA LÖFFLER      Ulmer’s Anti-Syphilis Film: Damaged Lives and Its NovelizationMARCEL ARBEIT      The Black CatGREGORY WILLIAM MANK      In Search of Jewish IdentitySHARON PUCKER RIVO      Moon of Alabama / Moon Over Harlem: African American Culture and German Imaginations from Brecht to UlmerFRANK MEHRING      Detour’s History/History’s DetourDANA POLAN      The Strange Woman: An Analysis with Gilles Deleuze’s Notion of the Impulse-ImageJULIA MEIER      The Logic of Contradiction and the Politics of Desire in RuthlessREYNOLD HUMPHRIES      The Man from Planet XMATTHEW SWENEY      Camp, Art Film, Classical Hollywood Cinema and Babes in BagdadHERBERT SCHWAAB      The Pleasures of the “Not-Quite Movie”: Murder Is My Beat and Daughter of Dr. JekyllEKKEHARD KNÖRER      Products of CircumstancesSTEFANIE DIEKMANN      The Naked Dawn: Production, Sources, and Mise-en-ScèneBILL KROHN      The Effects of the Displacement of Home in Daughter of Dr. JekyllMICHAL PEPRNÍK      What You See Is What You Get: Ulmer and the Nudist PicturePETRA HANÁKOVÁ      Geocinema and Geophilosophy: The CavernPHILIPP HOFMANN      Ulmer in the AquariumADRIAN MARTIN      About the Contributors      Index