Satan's Brew

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Audience Member Fassbinder attempts a screwball comedy and, well...let's just pretend it never happened. Rated 1/5 Stars •  Rated 1 out of 5 stars 02/01/23 Full Review Audience Member This movie and Haneke's "The Piano Teacher" both mock the notion of the madness of genius, but while Haneke portrays it as a kind of horror movie filled with dread Fassbinder approaches it as a breathlessly crazy screwball comedy. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 01/13/23 Full Review Audience Member This might bother some of Fassbinder's more 'serious' fans, but this is probably my favorite of all his films (that I've seen, anyway). Kurt Raab, usually Fassbinder's production designer, takes the lead role, giving a very Peter Lorre-ish performance as down-and-out leftist poet Walter Krantz. Unable get an advance from his publisher due to a lack of productivity, and under pressure from his unpleasant wife (Helen Vita), he struggles to make money, interviewing a prostitute for an upcoming book project which never materializes, blackmailing and murdering a variety of women, and even taking in a sycophantic female admirer (Margit Carstensen, almost unrecognizable) to get enough money to stay afloat. His murder of a masochistic mistress is under investigation by a slightly unhinged cop (Ulli Lommel, later to become a director himself), but Walter is more concerned with making money, and then later, his new obsession with the idea that he is in fact the reincarnation of homosexual German poet Stefan George. Bookended by a quote from Antonin Artaud, the film wears its Theatre of Cruelty influences on its tattered sleeve, with frenetic performances, outrageous dialogue, and bizarre, often offensive situations. I don't want to spoil too much, but if you like weird stuff, this is most definitely for you. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/25/23 Full Review Audience Member Black comedy about a poet who believes himself to be the reincarnation of the 19th century homosexual poet Stefan George. Fassbinder's work has plenty of slapstick and caricatural personages to keep an audience entertained; it is however undeniable tha somehow it feels as if the crazy situation gets out of his control as he awkwardly tries to drive a messy film to a sort of a conclusion in the end. As a surreal depiction of moral decadence it's quite amusing and engaging, but the coldness of it all makes it an over-zealous and self-indulgent kind of work. Rated 3/5 Stars •  Rated 3 out of 5 stars 01/24/23 Full Review Audience Member Una de las comedias mas bizarras y pachecas que he visto. Rated 4.5/5 Stars •  Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 02/05/23 Full Review Audience Member This absurdist is so strange that it's hard not to like. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/27/23 Full Review Read all reviews

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