Does it "hold up"?, is the mainstream question, for like... new audiences(?); as if any silent movie, no matter how great, still "holds up" with today's audiences! Not even the "hottest" filmmakers of our days, nor critics, seem to be able to bare a sitting through even the most representational and influential films of that era!.. Which silent ones would I recommend had I been-seriously-asked that question? Undoubtedly the ones that pop first to mind aside from the great comedies of Chaplin and Keaton, are the films of F. W. Murnau. From all his contemporaries, Murnau seemed to be the one to grasp the artform better that anybody. He tried what anybody should have set as their major goal: get rid of the title cards!.. This is a visual artform, right? Get rid of the letters and let them be in their own playground-literature. Epics as Nibelungen are opera, thus it's up to you whether you can fathom its exaggerated nature or dismiss it as not your cup-of-tea.
Kriemhild, as any sequel or prequel should, plays as a totally different movie than the first one. Kriemhild proves to be a much more interesting character than her heroic late husband, for the pioneering maestro behind this epic seems to be much more invested in her story; much more interested in capturing the earthly, gorgeous, wildcat's eyes and pressed-together lips of Margarete Schön, than the otherworldly, firelike lionwig of a dull übermensch Paul Richter plays; more interested even than capturing the -still- astonishing set-pieces. No wonder, albeit shots and scenes do, in an operatic fashion, drag on as much as in the first part, one doesn't have as much of a problem to keep up with this story, for one longs to see both the revenge (what the title's promising us) and our anti-heroine's outcome.
Overall, for film-buffs, Die Nibelungen seems as a meaningful (true) discovery, the study of which would enrich their understanding of the artform, renew their appreciation for it, and baffle them on why there's not as much of discussion surrounding this movie, for it has obviously inspired the creation of every saga since.