ABSTRACT
In order to tease out the entanglement and the social energy of silent historical films, in the wake of the First World War, this chapter focuses on limits, borders, and traffic, as symptomatically prevalent themes of relations between international bodies. For these borders were the very constructions that required crossing in order to reach and homogenize diverse bodies, both national and biological. The ability to view, experience, and even identify with myriad images was coupled with the flow and entanglement of transnational historical representations, forever changing a mass understanding and relationship to history. Historical films challenged traditional notions of history and raised questions of international connections within and beyond Germany. They created a common and entangled past through an economically and culturally entangled present, by focusing on monumental display for embodied viewers. The reflection of economic entanglement and film traffic was part of Lubitsch's stated conception of film.
