Wundkanal

A group of armed militants capture a Nazi criminal and force him to face up to what he has done. They “help” him do so by interrogating him and confronting him with his deeds—keeping at it until he is ready to stammer out some sort of confession. All this is followed by a suicide or a murder; a violent end in any case. This bête noire of West German cinema and a key work of political filmmaking is at once vexing, aestheticized, genuinely disturbing and akin to a reckless frontal attack in its drive to condense as many things as possible into a borderline paranoid mix: the Red Army Faction and Nazis, Stammheim and concentration camps, false suicides and the real mass murder of millions. Convicted Nazi criminal Dr Alfred Filbert, a former Obersturmbannführer and at one time deputy head of the Sicherheitsdienst’s foreign intelligence service, appears in the starring role. (Olaf Möller)

All retrospective films that will be shown at the Filmmuseum after the Viennale - from 30.10. - can of course also be reserved as usual at filmmuseum.at or by calling 01/533 70 54 and purchased at the box office of the Austrian Film Museum. The prices of the Austrian Film Museum apply.

Thomas Harlan: TORRE BELA (1975), WUNDKANAL (1984), SOUVENANCE (1990)