Der Sieger (1921) User Reviews

Victorious.

[morrison-dylan-fan · 7/10 · 22 September 2014]

Searching round for animated shorts to view for a poll being held on IMDbs Classic Film board,I was intrigued by a comment that a fellow IMDber made about how this film showed that Walt Disney had a lot of catching up to do with the laugh-o-grams he was making,which led to excitingly getting ready to find out who the animated victor of 1921 would be.

The plot:

Rising in the sky,the sun transforms into various circles and bounces on buildings and people.

View on the film:

Backed by a calming score,director Walter Ruttmann gets the film to rise above its advert origins,thanks to giving the animation a real hand-made collage appearance,which along with some rather strange triangular characters leads to this being a stylish never-ending circle.

Not a winner, but not a failure either

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 4 December 2015]

"Der Sieger" is a 1921 silent short film by German silent filmmaker Walter Ruttmann. it is possibly his most known short film work outside of the Opus quadrology. Just like "Opus II", "Opus III" and "Opus IV", it runs for roughly 3 minutes and is mostly about geometric shapes moving wildly all over the screen. However, there is more in here, namely faces. I think it was a Christmas tree that had a face here. Sounds like children animation, but it really was just Ruttmann experimenting with different styles and ideas still really early in his career. You could probably say that he peaked with his early works as these are the most known today. All in all, a mediocre watch at best and I do not recommend it.