In the Woodstock Times by Jay Blotcher

It's the day after Halloween.  You’ve just devoured two giant bags of candy left untouched by trick-or-treaters and sworn this is the last year you camp out in the pumpkin patch waiting in vain for you-know-who to show up.  

But don’t renounce the spirit of the season too quickly.  Some ghouls simply need their batteries recharged.  Happily, Upstate Films is screening the still-creepy “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” on Saturday, November 1, with original live musical accompaniment from Devil Music Ensemble.

The 1920 film, directed by Robert Wiene, remains a landmark in silent cinema.  Its German Expressionist style and iconic images inspired imitators throughout the subsequent decades, in homages as diverse as “Batman” and the Goth movement.

Devil Music Ensemble, led by Brendon Wood, has composed and performed live musical pieces for silent films that would intimidate lesser souls: Cocteau’s Blood of a Poet, Chaplin’s Modern Times and early shorts by The Lumiere Brothers.  This fall, DME tours with a program waggishly called Sound of Silents.

DME’s score for “Caligari” musically reimagines the film’s nightmarish plot of mind control and murder at a sideshow.  The eclectic composition includes motifs from Industrial music, circus instrumentation and electronica.

Upstate Films has screened many silent films in the past, featuring original accompaniment by pianist David Arner.  However, when DME first approached Steve Lieber, he jumped; Upstate had not shown

“Caligari” in nearly three decades.

”Now, this is a change of pace,” Lieber said; “an electric ensemble doing a classic silent film.”

THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI at Upstate Films.  Saturday, Nov 1, 1:00pm.  One performance only, with live accompaniment by Devil Music Ensemble.  6415 Montgomery Street/Route 9, Rhinebeck.  876-2515.  Tickets $10.

@Jay Blotcher