Editing Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (section)

==Style==
[[File:Sunrise (1927) - Trailer.webm|thumbtime=1|upright=1.2|thumb |left|''Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans'' trailer]]

''Sunrise'' was made by [[F. W. Murnau]], a [[Germany|German]] director who was one of the leading figures in [[German expressionist cinema|German Expressionism]], a style that uses distorted [[art design]] for symbolic effect. Murnau was invited by [[William Fox (producer)|William Fox]] to make an Expressionist film in Hollywood.

The resulting film features enormous stylized sets that create an exaggerated and fairy-tale world; the city street set alone reportedly cost over US$200,000 to build and was re-used in many subsequent Fox productions, including [[John Ford]]'s ''[[Four Sons]]'' (1928).<ref>Gallagher, Tag ''John Ford: The Man and his Films'' (University of California Press, 1986), p. 55 {{ISBN|0-520-05097-5}}</ref> Much of the exterior shooting was done at [[Lake Arrowhead, California]].

Full of cinematic innovations, the groundbreaking cinematography (by [[Charles Rosher]] and [[Karl Struss]]) features particularly praised [[tracking shot]]s. Titles appear sparingly, with long sequences of pure action and the bulk of the story told in Murnau's signature style. The extensive use of [[forced perspective]] is striking, particularly in a shot of the city with normal-sized people and sets in the foreground and smaller figures in the background by much smaller sets.

The characters go unnamed, lending them a universality conducive to symbolism.<ref>[[Molly Haskell]], ''[[From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies]]'' p. 46 {{ISBN|0-03-007606-4}}</ref> [[Veit Harlan]] compared his German remake ''[[Die Reise nach Tilsit]]'' (1939); pointing to the symbolism and soft focus of the original, he claimed that ''Sunrise'' was a poem, whereas his realistic ''Die Reise nach Tilsit'' was a film.<ref>Cinzia Romani, ''Tainted Goddesses: Female Film Stars of the Third Reich'' (Gremese, 2001), p. 86 {{ISBN|0-9627613-1-1}}</ref>