Gods of the Plague | Gِtter der Pest (1970)

Synopsis

Harry Baer, a Fassbinder discovery, plays a newly released ex-convict who slowly but surely makes his way back into the Munich criminal underworld.

The film was shot in Munich and Dingolfing during five weeks in October and November 1969 with Fassbinder eventually coming to consider it, shortly before he died, as the fifth-best feature film he made during his entire career.

Cast: Harry Baer, Ingrid Caven, Micha Cochina, Carla Egere, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Jan George, Hannes Gromball, Irm Hermann, Yaak Karsunke, Günther Kaufmann, Doris Mattes, Peter Moland, Lilo Pempeit, Katrin Schaake, Hanna Schygulla, Marian Seidowsky, Lilith Ungerer, Margarethe von Trotta


The film was shot in Munich and Dingolfing during five weeks in October and November 1969 with Fassbinder eventually coming to consider it, shortly before he died, as the fifth-best feature film he made during his entire career.

Kaja Silverman, author of the scholarly article "Fassbinder and Lacan: A Reconsideration of Gaze, Look, and Image," wrote that the film "holds subject and ideal image at the most extreme distance from each other and that, hence, attests most eloquently to the latter's recalcitrant exteriority." She further wrote that the character of Margarethe "sustains her identity through constant reference to an external representation." Commenting on the scene in which she sees herself in a poster of a face of a blonde woman, Silverman stated that it is "presumably a blown-up advertisement." It has also been noted that the film is replete with homoerotic symbolism.

Read about this film

Country: Germany
Language: German
Color: Black and White
Runtime: 91 min.