DER LACHENDE STERN

Structured like a musical collage, Der lachende Stern (The Laughing Star) is a film about the Philippines and the Third World. Its starting-point was the 1983 film festival in Manila, an event of high symbolic value for its founder, Imelda Marcos, the First Lady of the Philippines. Der lachende Stern reflects the cultural reality of the Philippines with interviews, excerpts from ethnological films, news broadcasts and «dramatizations». The latter include a wonderful dialogue between father and son, reminiscent of Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu, which identifies precisely the chasm between traditional ways of life and the excesses of «modernization». Schroeter unsparingly captures the fact that one of the few chances of survival for young people is prostitution - and that in a country, which, according to Imelda Marcos, «focuses on human resources». An extensive survey of a society at the brink of a dramatic cataclysm. (Gary India)