SOURCE: Rentschler, Eric. “The Problematic Pabst: An Auteur Directed by History.” In The Films of G. W. Pabst: An Extraterritorial Cinema, edited by Eric Rentschler, pp. 1-23. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1990.

In the following essay, Rentschler discusses Pabst as a “problematic” figure in cinema.

“None of us who knew Pabst well felt that we ever knew him at all. He was all things to all men, and nothing consistently. He would argue any side of the question with apparent complete conviction and sincerity, but to see this happen over and over was to suspect that he had no convictions at all. He worked like a scientist, presenting stimuli to his actors and watching their reactions with a cold-blooded detachment. He never made any comment, never explained himself. I always felt he lived his life completely alone.”

—Louise Brooks, in conversation with Richard Griffith¹

“Whereas the greatest artists...