Retrospektive 2018

Detour

Edgar G. Ulmer
USA 1945
63 min
V'18

Eines der verstörendsten Meisterwerke in der Geschichte Hollywoods, ein Z-Movie, das als Schauplätze karge Motelzimmer, Imbissbuden und vor allem die halluzinatorisch irreale Rückprojektion endloser Straßen zu bieten hat, sowie einen schmierigen Katatoniker als „Star". Eine Umleitung ins Verderben, ein vom flehenden und höchstwahrscheinlich erlogenen Voiceover seines armseligen Helden vorwärts getragener Film noir: Auf dem Weg nach Hollywood, zu seiner Geliebten, gerät der Nobody in ein Labyrinth fataler „Unglücksfälle“, das in Ulmers minimalistischer Gestaltung zu einem illusionslosen Schattenbild der kapitalistischen Gesellschaft wird.

Mit THE DEVIL THUMBS A RIDE

 

In 1595 Montaigne wrote “The thing I fear most in the world is fear ...” In DETOUR Edgar G. Ulmer traces fear in its more caustic representation. Tom Roberts, played somberly by Tom Neal, somewhere at the start of the film utters the phrase: “Fate sticks out a foot to trip you ...” Roberts’ fate will be meeting in labyrinthine ways, Vera, wonderfully portrayed by Ann Savage. Fate will become the constant and mounting fear that fears itself. Fate will become a nightmare of infinite proportions that agglutinates the very dark story that we are horribly being told. This film, one of the most disturbing pieces that I saw in my youth after persecuting it in every film club in Mexico, influenced by the recommendation of some of the iconic members of the French Nouvelle Vague, left a profound impression in me. The morbid pace, ominous and rather slow, the pace of nightmares, gave me reason to try as I could to envelop my movies with the notion of the nightmare, of the force of fate and the occurrence of omnipresent fear. I have many times, humbly and modestly, paid homage (which is a rather inadequate way of saying that I steal stuff from the Master) to the great and toxic Edgar G. Ulmer. (Arturo Ripstein)

With THE DEVIL THUMBS A RIDE

Credits
  • Edmund MacDonald
  • Tom Neal
  • Ann Savage
  • Claudia Drake
  • Tim Ryan
  • Esther Howard
  • Pat Gleason
  • Martin Goldsmith
  • Benjamin H. Kline
  • Leo Erdody
PRC (Producers Releasing Corporation)
35 mm
bw
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