546 - Berlin Alexanderplatz, Part 7, Germany, 1980. Dir. Werner Rainer Fassbinder.

Tuesday, December 18, 2018

546 - Berlin Alexanderplatz, Part 7, Germany, 1980.  Dir. Werner Rainer Fassbinder.

Remember, an Oath Can Be Amputated.

Franz Biberkopf is very much alive.

Reinhold and Meck deceived Cilly.  But then, we knew that.  We saw him alive in the last episode.  And we are not yet fully halfway through this series in which he stars.

Franz has trusted in the wrong people.

Reinhold is more than just a friend who needs Franz to help him with his love life.

And Pums is not actually selling fruit.

Pums is a gangster.  And the men at the bar, his "fruit vendors," are the members of his gang.  They call it a syndicate.

Including Reinhold.

And yes, including Meck.

Last night they got Franz to agree to go with them.  To "sell fruit."  It turned out to be a robbery.  They conscripted Franz to be their lookout man.

He resisted, but they compelled him.

He had chosen to go straight, but now he found himself in the middle of this situation.  He did not want to be here in the first place.  And the men got nervous about it.

What if he rats on them?

So they threw him out the back of the truck to be run over by the car behind them.

Some friends.

If the viewer knows anything about Franz, it is that he will not rat on another person regardless of what is going on in his own life.

Meck knows it.  But not everyone else in the gang does.  They are nervous, and they are angry.

They debate what to do with him.

And we realize that Reinhold, and even Meck, are not his friends.  Not really.

Franz has gone to Eva's apartment to recover.  He has lost his right arm.  He makes jokes about it.  What else are you going to do?

Eva lives with Herbert.  Her boyfriend.  Her new pimp.  Franz is her old boyfriend.  Her old pimp.  And probably still her true love.  The three of them are staying together.

Some families are less conventional than others.

Herbert leaves.

Bruno shows up.

Bruno is a member of Pums' gang.  The syndicate.

Remember the first movie Fassbinder ever made?  The one that looked like a student film?

It was Love is Colder than Death (1969).  In that movie, Fassbinder plays the main character, Franz Walsch.  It begins with a syndicate attempting to recruit him.  He says No.  So they send a man named Bruno to take him out.  Franz converts Bruno into being his friend and going on crime sprees together with him and his girlfriend Johanna.

Hmm.

Franz.  A syndicate.  They try to recruit him.  When he resists, they send Bruno.

Love is Colder than Death came out eleven (11) years before Berlin Alexanderplatz, when Fassbinder was 24 years old.  Berlin Alexanderplatz came out when he was 35 years old.

But, according to Richard Locke in The Threepenny Review, Fassbinder had read Doblin's novel first when he was 14 or 15 years old and again when he was 19 or 20.  So he had read it twice by the time he made his first film (and a third time when he was 30) (probably several times again by the time he filmed this film).

And he said that it "provided genuine, naked, concrete life support when I was really at risk during puberty."  He later said, "The novel had helped to determine the course of my life."

How many of his movies contain a character named Franz?

One might say he was influence by it.

Eva loves Franz, and she wants the syndicate to pay for what they did to him.  For luring him in.  For trying to kill him.  For making him lose his arm.

The syndicate believe a man named Herbert Wischow is agitating against them.  Is that the same Herbert who lives in this apartment?

Eva confronts Bruno.  Defends Franz.  Bruno puts his hand in his pocket.  Eva believes it is a gun.  She shouts a warning to Franz.  She grows increasingly hysterical.  Franz believes it is a gun.  He shouts back.  He gets hysterical.

The gang members have taken up a collection for Franz.  Maybe they can buy off his silence with their gesture of goodwill.  Make him believe it was an accident, as they have been saying.  Everyone has contributed.  Except Reinhold.

He had said, "You are not getting a penny out of me for this idiocy."

Some friend.

Bruno implies he is merely putting his hand in his pocket to produce the money the men collected for Franz.  Franz holds up a chair, ready to smash it against Bruno's brains.  He says he does not want their money.  He was not part of the burglary.  He did not know about it.  They took him there against his will, before he know where they were going.  He does not want to be made an accomplice by accepting payment.  Bruno can keep their money.

And as far as Franz is concerned, Bruno might really be drawing a gun.

We leave the scene without seeing the resolution.  Everyone shows up again later.  At least we know no one died in the confrontation.

Franz goes to the Red Light District.  An outdoor dead-end city block with women hanging out of windows showing their wares.  One with big wares walks up to him.  He declines.  His host, a carnival barker type man, offers him sumptuous delights, whatever he desires.  Franz is unmoved.  He asks for the greatest, most exciting thing he has to offer.  His hosts says the Whore of Babylon, and then describes her in a manner similar to John in the Book of Revelation.  Wow.  Only here it is not a metaphor for a spirit or world system.  It is an actual person for Franz to hire for the evening.

Throughout this film, this area of this city during this period has been portrayed as sordid.

One might imagine many a man declining such an offer.  Perhaps he was looking for some physical pleasure, but he might not have been planning to sell his soul for the evening.

Franz does not flinch.

"Doesn't sound bad, your offer."

The host encourages him to follow him.

But Franz declines.  "I'd rather not.  Anything you could show me now would only disappoint me.  Don't make the mistake of promising too much.  Everyone knows then he can only be disappointed."

And then, "Always the same old tune.  The well-known difference between fantasy and reality."

Franz leaves without making a purchase.  He can't get no satisfaction.  Meaning, he will not be finding any satisfaction tonight.  Because he knows if he tries, it will be unsuccessful.  Maybe disappointment is a norm for him.

He goes to a bar, which is empty, and enters as the two barmaids are telling a dirty joke to one another and laughing.  He orders three beers and a Kuemmel.  A Kuemmel is a flavored liqueur containing carraway seed, cumin, and fennel.

He talks to the drinks as he drinks them--or rather, he has the drinks talk to him--going into character, using different voices.  He drinks a beer and a half, then the Kuemmel, and then the other beer and a half.  He has fun.  He is entertaining.

Franz runs into Cilly at the nightclub that night.  She rages when she sees that he is alive and realizes that Reinhold lied to her and therefore had something to do with trying to eliminate him.

Franz meets Willy.

A gangster.

And befriends him.

And we anticipate that this man, who upon his release from prison resolved to go straight, is beginning to turn.

And go in another direction.


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"The great whore, the whore of Babylon, who sits by the waters.  You see a woman sitting on a scarlet beast.  The woman is full of the names of blasphemy.  She has seven heads and ten horns.  She is clothed in purple and scarlet, bejeweled with gold and precious stones and pearls, and holds a golden goblet in her hand.  And on her brow is written a name, a mystery, "Great Babylon, the mother of all Abominations on Earth.  The woman has drunk the blood of all the saints.  The woman is drunk with the blood of all the saints." - Berlin Alexanderplatz.

"So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet-colored beast full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.  And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication.  And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.  And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus; and when I saw her, I wondered with great wonderment." - Revelation 17:3-5.