Hardly a classic... barely a movie!

I disagree that it is hardly a movie. This is just a case of people being disingenuous because they didn't like the movie. Like the tired old music criticism of "But it isn't music! It's just noise!" I am not saying that everybody should think it's great. But a lot of things which superficially sound like criticism seem to be more honestly, simple dismissals. And yes, the OP saying that they only watched a few minutes is barely a review. Real criticism, functionally, is an analysis of what a work actually IS. Not what it *isn't* - such as other more "serious" Caligari movies, or some "type" of movie one likes better. I can certainly think about and critique a movie if it is not the kind of thing I would usually watch. If nothing else, it might teach me how not to make movies! XD

It might just be a matter of personal taste, but I love the production of Dr. Caligari. I prefer it when productions are stylized and creative, rather than striving for something realistic. Especially considering my other complaint about most movies being basically filmed plays, rather than pure visuals. So I find it a more honest point of departure for movies to play upon their obviously theatrical nature. That is to say, "stagey" is not necessarily a bad thing! Here I think it works extremely well.

I agree that Dr. Caligari is fairly surreal. But not that surrealism is purely aesthetic, and divorced from meaning. Surrealism is about using the vocabulary of dreams. These methods can be handy for short-circuiting the discursive aspects of the mind, and working at a more fundamental level of consciousness. There can be meanings, but not so much one concrete narrative meaning which can be easily explained or spoon-fed to people.