As far as can be discovered, he has looked thirty-five and has been six foot four ever since he was twelve. Under Reinhardt his first roles paid three marks a week. His first star turn involved a battle-axe and a fantastic headpiece that obscured his face. Realizing there was little call for giants onstage, he threw in his lot with motion pictures. Since then he’s been secretary, travel agent, still photographer, publicity writer, film cutter, title writer, handholder, and actor; everything but the night watchman. He began attracting attention by knocking over sets, volunteering for jobs for which he was hopelessly unqualified, and generally treating the serious side of studio life with unconscious humor. He was fired periodically and always reported again the next morning. Soon it became clear that since he had no usefulness in any single area of filmmaking, he had better become the boss, and direct. All the honors heaped upon him since then would form a very small pile.

And with all respect to Father Christmas, Murnau hasn’t any Utopian wishes to request; he has given up hoping for the perfect script, or the international star who doesn’t aim at being one, or the permanent company of actors at his disposal. But although such presents are beyond the bounds of possibility, Father Christmas’ magic wand could create the instrument which is much more important: the camera that can move freely in space.

What Murnau dreams of, when he lays his sleepless head to its pillow at night, is the camera that at any moment can go anywhere, at any speed. The camera that outstrips present film technique and fulfills the cinema’s ultimate artistic goal. The first difference between cinema and photography has to be that the viewpoint can be mobile, can share the speed of moving objects. He wants, viewed through mobile space, the encounter of surfaces; stimulation and its opposite, calm; a symphony made of the harmony of bodies and the rhythm of space; the play of pure movement, vigorous and abundant. He wants new modes of expression corresponding to the art of the image-machine, and he seeks them with the utmost perseverance. He wants the camera to be both participant and observer, like the dreamer who acts and watches himself doing so. He wants to move from the geometry of the one-dimensional surface to the geometry that applies in depth.

He wants to rid motion pictures of what does not belong to them, all that is unnecessary and trivial and drawn from other sources. That is what will be accomplished when films reach the level of art.