48 | OCTOBER 21 • 2021 

ARTS&LIFE
FILM

F

or 100 years, German 
silent horror film The 
Golem: How He Came 
Into the World has captivated 
audiences.
The 1920 release, direct-
ed by Paul Wegener, takes 
viewers on a journey through 
16th-century Prague, where a 
rabbi creates a giant clay crea-
ture brought to life by sorcery. 
The Golem’s role: to save 
Prague’s Jewish community 
from persecution, a theme 
relevant for millennia.
As a longtime staple of 
classic horror and Jewish 
film culture, The Golem is 
being brought back to life by 
Reboot, an arts and culture 
nonprofit that reimagines and 
recreates Jewish traditions. 
Its latest endeavor sees the 
New York-based organization 
splitting The Golem into an 
episodic series complete with 
new film scores, commentary 
as it takes on its legacy.
The new film scores, which 
will include the music of 
Detroit-based artist Gretchen 
Davidson, combine the work 
of numerous renowned musi-
cians and members of bands 
such as the Flaming Lips and 
Los Lobos, among others.
“The Golem is an amazing 
confluence around an important moment 
in cinematic horror films as well as a 
quintessential Jewish story,
” explains David 
Katznelson, Reboot CEO, “that has woven 
its way into the fabric of this bigger story 

around monsters that we tell 
and retell through film.
”
Often hailed as the “Jewish 
Frankenstein,
” The Golem has 
long been considered as an 
inspiration for the 1931 Boris 
Karloff Frankenstein film. 
It’s also helped create one of 
the most well-known Jewish 
fables about the occult that 
continues to be passed down 
to generations today.
To mark the film’s 100th 
anniversary of its theatrical 
release (which played in 
theaters in 1921, a year after 
its creation), the new Golem
reboot will be available for 
streaming Oct. 28 on Reboot’s 
website, just in time for 
Halloween weekend. It’s what 
Katznelson calls “a real Jewish 
story.
”
“There are themes about 
the occult, ghosts, Jewish 
history and how Hollywood 
sees the Jews,
” Katznelson 
says of the classic film, which 
will be split into eight sep-
arate episodes. “We see this 
idea of creation in the past as 
our Torah talks about it, but 
we also see it in the modern 
world.
”
Each of the eight episodes 
will take a deep dive into The 
Golem previously unseen in 
the original film. Packed with expert com-
mentary, new music and history about the 
film’s 100 years of influence, the episodes 
will take on a documentary-like feel while 
playing the original cuts.

ASHLEY ZLATOPOLSKY CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Silent horror fi
 lm The Golem is brought back to life 
as a reimagined episodic series.

Just in Time for
Halloween

TOP: Torri Yates-Orr and John K. Butcher will 
host each of the eight episodes.
BOTTOM: Screenshots from the broadast, 
which will feature scenes from the original 
film.

