German film professor Anton Kaes wrote, "The style of German Expressionism allowed the filmmakers to experiment with filmic technology and special effects and to explore the twisted realm of repressed desires, unconscious fears, and deranged fixations". The visual style of "Caligari" conveys a sense of anxiety and terror to the viewer, giving the impression of a nightmare or deranged sensibility, or a place transformed by evil, in a more effective way than realistic locations or conventional design concepts could. Siegfried Kracauer wrote that the settings "amounted to a perfect transformation of material objects into emotional ornaments". The majority of the film's story and scenes are memories recalled by an insane narrator, and as a result the distorted visual style takes on the quality of his mental breakdown, giving the viewers the impression that they are inside the mind of a madman. As with German Expressionist paintings, the visual style of "Caligari" reflects an emotional reaction to the world, and the film's characters represent an emotional response to the terror of society as embodied by Caligari and Cesare. Often in the film, set pieces are emblematic of the emotional state of the characters in the scene. For example, the courtyard of the insane asylum during the frame story is vastly out of proportion. The characters seem too big for the small building, and the courtyard floor features a bizarre pattern, all of which represent the patients' damaged frames of mind. Likewise, the scene with the criminal in a prison cell features a set with long vertical painted shadows resembling arrowheads, pointing down at the squatting prisoner in an oppressive effect that symbolizes his broken-down state.