531 - Katzelmacher, Germany, 1969. Dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder.
Es ist besser neue Fehler zu machen als die alten bis zur allgemeinen Bewusstlosigkeit zu konstituieren. - Yaak Karsunke.
It is better to make new mistakes than to make the old ones unconsciously. [Google translate]
It is better to make new mistakes than to perpetuate the old ones to the point of unconsciousness. [The movie's subtitles]
For Marie Luise Fleisser.
An apartment building can get claustrophobic. Especially when everyone knows everyone. And spends time together. Out front. In the restaurant. In the parking lot. At the park.
And in each other's rooms.
And gossips about it.
They lean against the railing and stare forward. They sit against the wall and stare forward. Occasionally someone looks at a 90-degree angle to the others, but otherwise they look straight ahead. Except during hook-ups, when the camera is low to the floor. And they begin to undress without emotion. Except for sudden flashes of anger.
The people live in Munich. Five men. Five women. They are young and have plenty of time on their hands. They drink. They smoke. They play cards. They sleep together. They strike each other. They sit. They talk. They gossip.
Munich itself can get claustrophobic. Especially when a foreigner arrives and disrupts things.
Jorgos arrives. Jorgos is from Greece. Jorgos disrupts things.
Elisabeth manages the place.
So she can let Jorgos move in if she wants to. And she can put him in Paul's room while the empty room is being painted. Whether Paul likes it or not. If she wants to.
Jorgos is a katzelmacher. Meaning something like a troublemaker. A kind of carpetbagger. He is a foreigner coming into this country to work. And he needs to leave.
And to exacerbate things, Paul reports his attributes from having seen him in his room. And Gunda speaks of his prowess in the park. So Marie develops a thing for him. And the others just want him gone.
And they will let him know it.
In a manner similar to the way in which Paul wanted to get rid of Helga's baby.
In a world (a microcosm, no, more like an enclosed bucket) where violence is the only expression, not to mention the only action, that these otherwise emotionless, actionless people ever show.
Katzelmacher explores themes of angst and ennui, economics and sex, misogyny and xenophobia. One senses the influence of Sartre and Camus at one end, Godard and Bergman at the other. One can see Fassbinder's burgeoning talent hard at work. One recognizes the early faces of several Fassbinder company members and senses their future work eager to be born.
The film is structured in a stylistically formal manner. It is shot in black and white. The walls are white, and the furniture and clothing is white, cream, or light.
The camera sits on a tripod and stays static during interior and exterior shots of pairs or groups of people standing, leaning, or sitting with their backs to the wall facing forward. They rarely look one another in the eyes. Occasionally, someone will sit at a right angle to the others, facing in.
A refrain shot occurs where the camera dollies backwards with a pair of people, often arms entwined, walking steadily forward.
Throughout the film people speak and act with little to no affect, with occasional bursts of shocking violence and anger.
Nearly everything happens, or does not happen, on the sidewalk or in the rooms or in the restaurant. With Marie and Jorgos in the park.
One can feel the turmoil exploding in society in 1969. And inside of Fassbinder.
And in this unsettling, underplayed story, one can see his talent.
* * * *
Your wife?
No understand.
And what about love?
Not for me. It makes you old.
I like you. I'll never leave you.
Don't understand. Boom Boom.
It's over now.
And then I'll go to the army. It's better than working and having ideas that never come to anything, and nothing changes.
And in Summer he's taking me to Greece.
What about his wife?
That doesn't matter. Everything's different in Greece.
* * * *
Hanna Schygulla with Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Johanna in Love is Colder Than Death
Marie in Katzelmacher
Lisaura in Das Kaffeehaus
Johanna in The Niklashausen Journey
Johanna in Gods of the Plague
Hanna in Rio des Mortes
Hanna in Whitey
Hanna in Beware of a Holy Whore
Berta in Pioneers in Ingolstadt
Anna in The Merchant of Four Seasons
Karin in The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant
Luisa Mauer in Breman Freedom
Effi in Effi Briest
Irmgard in Acht Stunden sind kein Tag
Doctor in Jail Bait
Maria in The Marriage of Maria Braun
Susanne in The Third Generation
Willie in Lili Marleen
Eva in Berlin Alexanderplatz
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