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IMAGINE KUBRICK IN A BERLIN SQUAT WITH A MOUND OF SPEED
When Stanley met Werner
Stanley Kubrick and Rainer Werner Fassbinder were two giants of post war cinema. If only they had met, says Paul Dale
his month two monsters of cinema meet in the central belt. As German auteur Rainer Werner Fassbinder‘s takes over the Glasgow Film Theatre (courtesy of Goethe lnstitut) with a small selection of his better known films (l’ear liars the Soul. Efli Brest. The Bitter Tears of Petra l’oii Kant and his most commercially successful film The Marriage of Maria Braun). a poster exhibition and free drop-in documentary screenings; an almost complete retrospective of the films of Stanley Kubrick breaks ground at Edinburgh’s Filmhouse. These two remarkable filmmakers never met. yet despite being traumatised by once having to witness the sang froid that arose when Francois ()/.on (Fassbinder's natural successor) and Peter Greeiiaway (the Kubrick of the public purse) met. god. I wish they had. These two very different directors could have Ieamed so much from each other. Imagine if they had swapped place for a day. a month. a year. Kubrick holing himself up in some dingy house in Berlin with his favourite actors amongst the half ripped temazepam packets and mounds of dexamphetamine.
and being forced to churn out a film in a couple of
days. No researchers holding folders containing examples of 17th century quill pens and certainly no model space ships. Or imagine Fassbinder. with his bad skin. cigarette pennanently in hand and penchant for verbal abuse stomiing around Shepperton Studios envoking the spirit of his hero Jean-Marie Straub as he dismantled the lives of the superficially contented crew of the SS Discovery with a dissection of their banal social conventions. I would like to see that film
44 11‘“ LIST 5—19 Mar 2009
and would also like to see the one Kubrick would make in his Berlin stllliII. Maybe it would hark back to this expatriate :\lllL‘l'lCilll.\ sparse atid beautiful New York photography of the I‘Hlls. Maybe it would bring out Kubrick‘s talent for (any ()n style facctioiisiiess occasionally glimpsed ltiiosl noticeably in tlic spccded tip motion copulation to the William Tell ()ycrtiirc in .-I ('lot'kii'm'k ()i'aiict'l.
I‘assbinder and Kubrick did. obsession with syntax and stylisation. eycii if they emerged from \cry different traditions. More crucially it can be argued that Kubrick and I‘lhshllltIc‘l' despised tbc yery humanity that pow cred their greatest films (Iiassbiiidcr was \itriol personified and Kubrick annihilated it in Dr Strange/ore and inoyed off into otitei sp ice in _()()/l
Ibc truth is lit it It id lassbinder liyed past his 37 years. he would haye taken eycryonc to the woodshcd and schooled them. .Itist look at what he did when be shifted genre. His rarely seen W7] western ll’liiiy’ pours sauerkraut oycr Leone's spaghetti with unforgettable effect. In l‘)75 l-‘assbindcr esen interpreted .‘I ('loc/omr/v Orange in his own iiiyertcd trenchant manner with Mother Kristen (rues in Heaven. These are the films I wish they were showing iii Glasgow: lie was Brecht. Godard and :\rtaud to Kubrick‘s luniplisted parabolist. We will not see his like again.
after all. share an
Fassbinder, GFT, Glasgow, until Sun 29 Mar. Kubrick: A Retrospective from Fri 6 Mar-Sun 5 Apr.
THE BEST FILM & DVD RELEASES
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* Bronson Britain‘s most notorious prisoner gets his own cult biopic courtesy of Danish Pusher king Nicolas Winding Rein. Tom Hardy is a revelation as Bronson. See review. right. General release. Fri 73 Mar.
* Watchmen Zack 300 Snyder's very decent adaptation of Alan Moore's seminal graphic novel. See review. page 46. General release. Fri 6 Mar.
II: Wendy and Lucy Introspection and loneliness come under the microscope in Kelly O/d Joy Reichardt's new film. Like Taxi Driver for girls. See profile. in listings and review. page 47. Cameo. Edinburgh and selected release, Fri 6 Mar.
* Three Monkeys Enigmatic Turkish film noir. GFT. Glasgow, Sun 8—Tue 70 Mar.
* Che - Part No Endgame for the great revolutionary. Selected release, out now.
* Gran Torino Clint Eastwood steps up to the plate one last time. General release. out now.
* The Class Schoolyard nightmares. French style. Selected release, out now.
* Kubrick: A Retrospective Near complete season of Kubrick’s to coincide with the re-release of Barry Lydon on a lovely new print. See preview. left. Fi/mhouse. Edinburgh, Fri 6 Mar-Sat 4 Apr.
* Fassbinder See preview. left. GFT, Glasgow, until Mon 29 Mar.
* Not Quite Hollywood Frenetic and illuminating documentary about the history of Australian exploitation cinema. See interview, page 49. Out Mon 30 Mar (Optimum).