THE BITTER TEARS OF RAINER WERNER FASSBINDER: A COLLABORATION WITH THE MELBOURNE QUEER FILM FESTIVAL

7:00PM – QUERELLE

Rainer Werner Fassbinder
 (1982) 108 mins R18+

Fassbinder’s final film—a multinational production released posthumously just months after his tragic death—is an adaptation of one of Jean Genet’s most lurid and scandalous novels depicting the murderous, criminal and sexual exploits of a young psychopathic sailor (Brad Davis) in the port of Brest. Eschewing the characteristically blunt and direct naturalistic style that defined his filmmaking throughout the 1970s, Fassbinder further develops his experiments with colourful, Anger-esque expressionism initiated in Lola. With Jeanne Moreau and Franco Nero.

CTEQ ANNOTATION
The Betrayals of Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s ‘Querelle’ by Claire Henry.

9:00PM – THE BITTER TEARS OF PETRA VON KANT

Rainer Werner Fassbinder
 (1972) 122 mins M

Fassbinder adapts his own play about an emotionally sadistic fashion designer and the handful of women who visit her in the garish bedroom in which she holds court. The film’s long takes, deep focus cinematography and dispassionate, faux-theatrical style work against the melodrama of the material, creating a dissonance that allows Fassbinder’s searingly critical self-portrait to show up in sharp relief. The all-female ensemble of Fassbinder regulars (Margit Carstensen, Hanna Schygulla and Irm Hermann) creates a memorable gallery of desperate grotesques.

Whose are the Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant? by Cerise Howard.

The Melbourne Cinémathèque is pleased to continue its collaboration, inaugurated in 2015, with the Melbourne Queer Film Festival, Australia’s preeminent queer film event and Melbourne’s second biggest film festival. This partnership presents a chance to explore the rich historical roots of the queer cinematic canon through the festival’s first ‘Pioneers’ program.