It's difficult for me to rank a film as old as this on a numbered scale, especially considering that that number scale compares the rating of films from this time period to contemporary ones with the advantages of over ninety years of technology and innovation, crafted on budgets that dwarf these that were created when movies were still a novelty.
"Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans" is a simple love story. The Man (George O'Brien) is tempted into having an affair with the Woman From the City (Margaret Livingston) and is asked to murder his Wife (Janet Gaynor) by drowning her in a lake. He resists, and the couple rediscover their love for each other through a visit to the city.
"Sunrise" is a great film that pulls out a ton of visual tricks from the day and employs a ton of creative uses of flashback and cutaway sequencing to tell its narrative. The acting is also phenomenal. Silent films just do a great job, a lot of the time, of showing us the visual and physical side of acting that we normally don't notice in modern movies.
I recommend "Sunrise" to anyone who has an interest in watching one of the greatest silent films of all time, and anyone who has an interest in the history of cinema in general. Interesting to note, "Sunrise" won the 1927 Academy Award for Unique and Artistic Picture, the first and only of the category. The category would later be folded in with Outstanding Picture the following year, which is known today as Best Picture. So in a way, you could say that this is one of the first two winners of the Academy Award for Best Picture, an honor shared with the film "Wings."
Beyond its awards and accolades, "Sunrise" is a very enjoyable movie with a simple but engaging story that is executed masterfully and is a joy to watch. I would recommend this to anyone who is serious about movies as a form of artistic expression.
"Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans" is a simple love story. The Man (George O'Brien) is tempted into having an affair with the Woman From the City (Margaret Livingston) and is asked to murder his Wife (Janet Gaynor) by drowning her in a lake. He resists, and the couple rediscover their love for each other through a visit to the city.
"Sunrise" is a great film that pulls out a ton of visual tricks from the day and employs a ton of creative uses of flashback and cutaway sequencing to tell its narrative. The acting is also phenomenal. Silent films just do a great job, a lot of the time, of showing us the visual and physical side of acting that we normally don't notice in modern movies.
I recommend "Sunrise" to anyone who has an interest in watching one of the greatest silent films of all time, and anyone who has an interest in the history of cinema in general. Interesting to note, "Sunrise" won the 1927 Academy Award for Unique and Artistic Picture, the first and only of the category. The category would later be folded in with Outstanding Picture the following year, which is known today as Best Picture. So in a way, you could say that this is one of the first two winners of the Academy Award for Best Picture, an honor shared with the film "Wings."
Beyond its awards and accolades, "Sunrise" is a very enjoyable movie with a simple but engaging story that is executed masterfully and is a joy to watch. I would recommend this to anyone who is serious about movies as a form of artistic expression.