Highly influential figure of German film whose list of credits--ranging from the seminal, expressionistic "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" (1919) to the sophisticated early talkie, "Ariane" (1931)--reads like a history of Weimar cinema. Mayer's work stands out from that of his contemporaries thanks to his concern with social issues; working in a film culture which was more concerned with form than content, he managed to inject a grainy realism into the Expressionist visual style, notably in films such as "Sylvester" (1923) and F.W. Murnau's "The Last Laugh" (1924).

Though he turned down the