Germany

Here’s the final film of Uwe Schrader’s proletarian trilogy, following White Trash AKA Kanakerbraut [Germany] and Sierra Leone [Germany] . Without a straight narrative, a couple of stories revolve around the last days of a stripclub called ‘Mau Mau’.

MAU MAU is located right in the middle of the red light district. When night falls on the city, the joint starts jumping in MAU MAU. Stripping, pimping, ripping off and grifting are the order of the day. Sometimes it’s all very agreeable and sometimes all hell breaks loose. Celebrations and snivelling go hand in hand here. In this world of the marooned, the stumbling and those who have gotten back on their feet, the film traces the lifelines of Inge and Heinz, of Rosa and Doris and of Ferdi and Ali on their search for love, happiness and life. “If I had the choice of filming in heaven or hell,” says Uwe Schrader, “then I’d choose hell”.Read More »

Quote:
Pornography in the service of politics. An outrageous provocation, this attack on reactionary German legislation discriminating against young film directors, features head-on, close-up shots of a penis ‘mouthing’ the parliamentary defense of the law by its author. This is followed by masturbation of the organ by an anonymous female hand, ending with ejaculation into the camera and a close-up of a nude behind ‘blowing’ out a candle (with appropriate sound). A landmark in political pamphleteering, the film was selected for the 1968 Oberhausen International Short Film Festival by a committee of leading German critics, and promptly banned by the (social-democratic!) city government, causing the withdrawal of almost all German directors from the festival and a national scandal. The title satirically refers to the official certificate of ‘Particularly Valuable’ given each year to the best film shorts by an Establishment selection committee.Read More »

IMBD wrote:
While out on the town in Berlin, Raymond (Ulli Lommel) sees and falls for Harlis (Mascha Rabben), a star of a troupe of lesbian cabaret strippers. Attracted to a man for the first time, Harlis leaves her long time girlfriend and dance partner Pera (Gabriele Lafari). Overwhelmed by jealousy and anger, Raymond’s brother Peter (Rolf Zacher) and his ex-fiancee Ria (Heidy Bohlen) are determined to sabotage this budding romance.Read More »

Directed by three students, Studies on Hysteria is about about a young man played by Philip Wilhelmi discovering pants in a nudist world. Read More »

IMDB:
Edmond, a man in his sixties whose wife has recently passed away, is told about a secret establishment where men can spend an entire night in bed alongside beautiful, sleeping young women, who stretch, roll over and dream, but never awaken. Bedazzled by their seductive yet innocent tenderness, but distressed about the reason for their deep sleep, he delves into the mystery of the house of sleeping beauties. Read More »

quote:
This is a pretty little student’s film with a peculiar background story. It was shot in spring 1968, produced by the Film- & Television Academy (dffb) of West-Berlin, which at that time was a hotbed of political turmoil. The recently founded film school played an important part during the escalation year of 1967/8. Among the students of these years were filmmakers such as Hartmut Bitomsky, Christian Ziewer, Harun Farocki and Wolfgang Petersen.

By 1967/68 the overall climate had become highly charged with politics and revolutionary fever. At least two students of that era abandoned filmmaking and turned into left-wing terrorists: the famous Holger Meins (1941-1974), who joined the RAF, and Philip Werner Sauber (1947-1975) who joined the lesser-known, but no less radical group “Bewegung 2. Juni”. While Meins died while on a hunger strike in the prison of Stammheim, the Swiss-born Sauber was killed during a shoot-out with the police in Cologne, just after he had shot to death a policeman.Read More »

IMDB:
Nina, an end-of-teenage orphan with mental problems, starts a new job as a garden cleaner when she meets Toni. They fell in love with each other, but soon Toni starts betraying Nina. In the meantime, Francoise is picked up at a psychic department of a Berlin hospital by her husband, Pierre. After seeing Nina, Francoise believes that she has found her kidnapped daughter Marie, but neither Toni nor Pierre believe her. Nina is unsure about what to think… Read More »

– “What would you do if you had only ten days to live”?
– “Just get very stoned.”

DANDY (1988 )- a Voltaire-inspired anti-fairytale by Peter Sempel – Featuring Blixa Bargeld, Nick Cave, Kazuo Ohno & Nina Hagen.Read More »

Synopsis
Ruza left Serbia, her country, over 30 years ago and lives in Zurich. Her daily life is a string of repetitive moments until, one day, Ana arrives on the scene and upsets Ruza’s painstakingly organized world. A subtle friendship develops between the two strong willed women.Read More »