Humor, warmth define this Fassbinder work
Hairier r-assomoer may not be
the most talented of the new West
German directors, but he is cer
tainly the most prolific and the
most elusive.
Mother Kusters Goes to
Heaven, made in 1975 and show
ing through Sunday at Cinema 7,
is his 27th film, and, in a number of
crucial ways, represents a sub
stantial departure from his previ
ous work. Its defining qualities —
warmth, compassion, and a
genuine sense of humor — have
not been conspicuous in the
director’s previous work. Thus
Kusters is both the richest and the
most cheerful and accessible
Fassbinder shown locally (with
the possible exception of Ali: Fear
Eats the Soul; for those keeping
score, Kusters is the seventh
Fassbinder shown in Eugene).
For me, Fassbinder’s place in
the contemporary cinema has be
come increasingly uncertain.
While each of his films has
genuine merits, all share a world
view marked by a pervasive bit
terness so powerful it almost
seems to celebrate human degra
dation. Suicide, usually presented
as a reasonable alternative to con
tinued existence, is prevalent
enough in Fassbinder to suggest
an undercurrent of something like
death worship; his misanthropy
comes slickly packaged as politi
cal radicalism. As a result, it often
seems as though his visual imagi
nation, his skill in crafting forceful,
evocative images, is enlisted in
the service of a morally dubious
world-view.
Fassbinder is by no means a
negligible artist, but, despite his
critical prominence, he has not yet
established himself among the
dozen most important filmmakers
in the world; his name does not
belong on the list that begins with
Altman and Antonioni and ends
with Welles, Wenders, and Wil
der.
If Mother Kusters is typical of
his most recent work, Fassbinder
may soon be as important as his
defenders have long claimed. The
film opens with one of the most
forceful — and emotionally
charged — sequences in the
director’s work. An almost numb
ingly banal, mechanical vignette
of ‘ family life” is disrupted by the
news that the breadwinner,
hard-working, considerate, and,
perhaps, a trifle dull, has run
amok, killing his boss and throw
Family Circus offers topical humor
Portland’s Family Circus Thea
ter Collective will present an even
ing of topical humor Saturday at 8
p.m. at the Community Center for
'the Performing Arts, Eighth Av
enue and Lincoln Street.
Included in the show will be a
presentation called ' Rip City Fol
lies.” A fast-paced comedy in
spired by vaudeville shows of the
20s ano 30s, ‘‘Follies’’ includes
tap-dancing, songs, stand-up
comedy routines, slap-stick, jug
gling and music, to make a com
ment on city planning.
The play is designed specifi
cally for older people. “Millie and
Max” and Lulu Leroy, retired vau
devillians, stage a show to rally
the residents of their hotel from
which they are to be evicted.
The show will also feature the
Family Circus Chorus. Performing
works by the collective and other
movement composers, the chorus
sings political songs about such
issues as civil rights, the women’s
movement and gay rights.
mm
The Family Circus
Tickets for Saturday’s show are
$2.50 in advance at the WOW
Hall, and $3 at the door.
■ i
rri. & Sat.
April 22 & 22
8:30 & 11:30
$4.50
SEA
LEVEL
Thurs., April 27
8:00 & 11:00
$6.00
DAVE Fri., April 28
VAN RONK *°°
Don’t miss Ariola recording artist
MAC McANALLY
Wed., April 19 - $1.00
EUGENE’S NEW MUSIC CENTER
FINE DINING
160 S. Park
21 & over ■ ID required
ing himself into the machinery at
his factory.
The sequence in which his
wife, Mother Kusters, her face torn
asunder by an expressive
shadow, hears of her husband's
death, is deeply moving. Shortly
later, within a single shot, she is
shown alone in her kitchen doing
her household chores, is visited
[
barely articulated. The ways she
projects perplexity, common
sense, instinctive decency, and,
always a quiet dignity, often simul
taneously, explains how the
character avoids being over
whelmed by the assorted lunacies
she encounters.
Mother Kusters is at once a
specific individual and a symbol of
By DAVID COURSEN
Mother Kusters
Goes to Heaven
by two journalists, and, finally sits
down, again alone with her grief
and numb confusion. Through
much of the film, the woman’s
mute, heartfelt pain works as a
savagely effective counterpoint to
the cynicism of the screen life that
surrounds her.
Much of the force of these
scenes comes from Brigitte Mira's
meticulous, understated acting
performance. She does remarka
ble things with small emotions,
slightly overbearing maternal
love, tolerance, and a grief that is
the apolitical working class. As a
sensible person, she is confused
by the contradictions of the leftist
rhetoric that bombards her
through much of the film. The
film’s “happy ending” may seem
contrived, and it is, but it is also
entirely plausible as a pragmatic
response to the world the film has
explored for the preceding two
hours of screen time.
Mother Kusters is further en
riched by an abundance of
genuinely funny details. Often,
Fassbinder’s films are so bitter
that their blackly humorous satire
is almost completely cerebral,
calculated to evoke a few smirks,
but very little laughter. Several
scenes in Mother Kusters are al
most hilarious.
As the background to “job inter
view” — ending with the ‘impre
ssario” iecherously licking his lips
— a “‘ballerina’’ ineptly goes
through her paces, with a mute
persistence that offhandedly re
calls would-be country singing
star Sueleen Gay in Nashville.
Cruder, but equally funny is the
Nixon
(Continued from Page 6B)
for him. The tone and intent in The
Public Burning are not only inap
propriate, but also stupid.
Coover, always anxious to hack
out fresh frontiers in modern fic
tion, lacks direction. John Barth's
and Nathaniel West’s writing, in
some instances, possess that
elusive vision for which Coover
aspires. In the meantime, he re
mains in thrall to the muses of
mediocrity.
And aesthetically, Coover un
wittingly places himself in the
literary class of such bantam
weight novelists as Spiro Agnew
and John Erlichman.
song performed by the “Factory
Murderer’s Daughter," a woeful
tale of shit in the streets and the
sorrow of having a boyfriend leave
her for another man.
Nor does Fassbinder overlook
the irony of a Communist couple,
living in bourgeois splendor
purchased with the wife's inher
ited wealth, pontificating about the
ciass struggle. The film’s jour
nalists are uniformly dressed like
refugees from a leather bar, com
plete with black leather jackets
and tight pants.
Finally, Fassbinder’s easy rap
port with his “stock company” of
actors allows them to give even
the most despicable villains a kind
of hammy bravado that is slyly
funny.
No doubt it is misleading to
dwell entirely on the feeling and
the humor in Mother Kusters; in its
own way, it is as cold, biting, and
angry as the rest of Fassbinder's
work. But here, cruelty and exploi
tation are counterpoised by more
humane qualities. Fassbinder is
still quick to judge and condemn,
but he does not do so with quite
the same overbearing relentless
ness that characterizes much of
his previous work.
Whether Mother Kusters
heralds growth in Fassbinder’s ar
tistic sensibility or simply a fortuit
ous variation on his customary
themes, it is a remarkable film.
Accompanying Mother Kusters
is How Much Wood Would a
Woodchuck Chuck?, a new short
film by Werner Herzog, arguably
the world’s foremost young direc
tor. Through Cinema 7’s diligent
programming and a quirk of film
distribution, Woodchuck's
Eugene run will be its North
American theatrical premiere en
gagement.