Berlin
Von: "martin last" <[email protected]>
An: [email protected]
Betreff: [MOPO] Best Actress: Underwhelming exhibition in Berlin
I was in Berlin on business yesterday and managed to squeeze in a quick visit to the film museum there.
I wanted to catch their current special exhibition “Best Actress”, which (unsurprisingly) covers the Best Actress Oscar winners of the last 73 years.
Having seen an excellent film stills exhibition on a previous visit to Berlin, I was anything but impressed with “Best Actress”. Perhaps I’m being a bit harsh but the majority of the show appeared to consist of a few stills and publicity photographs of each of the actresses. Many of these did not appear to be “vintage original”. There were also a few uninspiring posters (e.g. German A1 of Butterfield 8), common magazine covers (literally stuck on a wall) and some fairly uninspiring costumes (one was a Leigh dress from Gone With The Wind admittedly). Not an Oscar in sight. I was seriously underwhelmed. At the risk of bragging, I am sure that I could rustle up a much more interesting selection of (vintage original) photographs and posters for the bigger names.
This is not my first underwhelming exhibition experience. I remember a particularly small Monroe exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in London. For the amount and quality of material on show the entry charge was incredible. I think there were one or two really nice things but I remember thinking then as well that I could have given the curator a good run for his or her money.
Another thing about the Berlin museum is that some of the rarer posters displayed (e.g. for Caligari and Metropolis) appear to be good quality repros. While I appreciate that light is the enemy of posters and care needs to be taken, if I visit a museum I expect to see the real thing. If posters are rotated and “rested” regularly it should be possible to show real stuff all the time - I know museums “rest” vintage photographs to help preserve them.
Despite all my moaning I would still recommend the Berlin museum, especially for those into the 20s/30s German films and Dietrich. As I said, the stills exhibition I saw there a couple of years back was excellent. Their next special show is “Things To Come” (science fiction). I’ll definitely give that one a try too.
A few questions to members:
1. Have you also had such underwhelming exhibition experiences?
2. What do think about museums displaying copies?
3. What is the best and worst movie-related exhibition or museum you have ever visited?
To unsubscribe from the MoPo-L list, click the following link:
https://listserv.american.edu/scripts/wa-american.exe?SUBED1=MoPo-L&A=1
To unsubscribe from the MoPo-L list, click the following link:
https://listserv.american.edu/scripts/wa-american.exe?SUBED1=MoPo-L&A=1
