#198: FASSBINDER, Rainer Werner: Ali: Fear Eats The Soul (1974)

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FASSBINDER, Rainer Werner (Germany)
Ali: Fear Eats The Soul [1974]
Spine #198
DVD


Rainer Werner Fassbinder, already the director of nearly twenty films by the age of twenty-nine, paid homage to his cinematic hero, Douglas Sirk, with this updated version of Sirk's All That Heaven Allows. Lonely widow Emmi Kurowski (Brigitte Mira) meets Arab worker Ali (El Hedi ben Salem) in a bar during a rainstorm. They fall in love — to their own surprise, and to the shock of family, colleagues, and drinking buddies. In Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (Angst essen Seele auf), Fassbinder expertly uses the emotional power of the melodrama to reflect the ethnic tensions within German society.

93 minutes
Color
Monaural
in German
1:33:1 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2003
Director


Film Rating (0-60):

60

The Extras

The Booklet

Sixteen-page booklet featuring essays by Chris Fujiwara and Michael Töteberg.

Commentary

None.

Introduction

By director Todd Haynes (Far From Heaven).
Interviews

With actress Mira and editor Thea Eymèsz.
Short film

Angst isst Seele auf (2002).
From the BBC:

Signs of Vigorous Life: New German Cinema.
Excerpt

From The American Soldier featuring Margarethe von Trotta.
Original theatrical trailer

Extras Rating (0-40):

39

60 + 39 =

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