"Director: Rainer Werner Fassbinder"

• Despair | DVD | (23/04/2012) from £20.23   |  Saving you £-4.24 (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Chocolate, cuckoldry and doppelganger delusion abound in Rainer Werner Fassbinder's stunning English language adaptation of Vladimir Nabokov interwar novel. The chocolate business has been good to Russian exile Hermann. He enjoys the good life with his beautiful wife Lydia. But Hermann is addicted to out-of-body experiences and when he meets a tramp on a business trip, he develops an insane plan of escape. Featuring international stars Dirk Bogarde (Death in Venice) and Andra Ferrol (La Grande Bouffe) and adapted by British dramatist Tom Stoppard (Shakespeare in Love), Fassbinder’s Despair is a vivid off-kilter masterwork set against the background of the Nazis in ascendance. This DVD version of Fassbinder’s ‘most optimistic film’ is accompanied by exclusive bonus material. Extras: Documentary “The Cinema and It’ Double” (70 minutes) Image gallery

• Fassbinder Collection Volume One (Lola/ Martha/ Why Does Herr R Run Amok?/ I Dont Just Want You To Love Me) | DVD | (22/10/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £40.99

  One of the most acclaimed and controversial post-war German filmmakers Rainer Werner Fassbinder created a prolific and extraordinarily influential body of work that revolutionised cinema. Lola: Conceived as a homage to Josef Von Sternberg's 'The Blue Angel' 'Lola' is a biting satire of capitalist greed starring Barbara Sukowa as the eponymous cabaret singer and call girl. Why Does Herr R Run Amok?: Fassbinder's savage and provocative portrait of middle-class banality and alienation follows the monotonous daily routines of the mild-mannered Herr R. Until one evening he finds that he can take no more. Martha: Margit Carstensen stars as a young woman who finds herself slowly stripped of her freedom by her sadistic and tyrannical husband. Fassbinder's bold homage to Douglas Sirk's 1950s Technicolor melodramas finds him at his most wickedly perverse and stylistically assured. I Don't Just Want You To Love Me: Fassbinder's friends and closest colleagues remember him in this documentary profile which also includes interviews with Fassbinder himself and excerpts from his work.

• Fear Eats The Soul | DVD | (07/08/2006) from £34.90   |  Saving you £-14.91 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Rainer Werner Fassbinder already the director of almost twenty films by the age of twenty-nine paid homage to his cinematic hero Douglas Sirk with this updated version of Sirk's All That Heaven Allows. Lonely widow Emmi Kurowsky (Brigitte Mira) meets Arab worker Ali (El Hedi ben Salem) in a bar during a rainstorm. They fall in love - to their own surprise - and to the shock of family colleagues and drinking buddies. Fassbinder expertly uses the emotional power of the melodrama to underscore the racial tensions threatening German culture at the time.

• Querelle | DVD | (21/01/2002) from £20.00   |  Saving you £-0.01 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Adapted from Jean Genet's novel the final film of director Fassbinder's career is a surreal tale of sex and murder that has become a cult favourite. Brad Davis (Midnight Express Chariots Of Fire) stars as Querelle an enigmatic drug-dealing sailor on shore leave in the port of Brest. Amidst the sultry highly charged atmosphere he embarks on a journey of sexual self-discovery. With its striking iconic imagery set against the orange glow of a permanent sunset Querelle is a d

• The Rainer Werner Fassbinder Collection Vol. 3 | Blu Ray | (13/06/2022) from £75.57   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Rainer Werner Fassbinder, the enfant terrible of the New German Cinema, wrote, directed, produced and starred in over 40 films in his short but prolific life, before passing away of a drugs overdose in 1982 aged just 37. Rainer Werner Fassbinder vol. 3 brings together a collection of his lesser seen works from various stages in his career, featuring high definition digital restorations prepared by the Rainer Werner Fassbinder Foundation. The American Soldier sees Fassbinder continue to pursue the cinephilic homage to classic Hollywood crime films of his feature debut, Love is Colder than Death, in a tale of a German-American Vietnam vet turned small-time hoodlum who finds himself on the wrong side of the law in Munich, where he grew up. Unseen between its first television broadcast in 1970 and its rediscovery in 2002, The Niklashausen Journey chronicles the journey of a young peasant in the 15th century and his quest to overcome social injustice, in Fassbinder's allegorical critique of the student movement. Gods of the Plague portrays a newly released ex-con as he reacquaints himself with Munich's criminal underworld to plan the robbery of a supermarket. In Rio Das Mortes, two feckless young friends, Michel and Günther, embark on a hare-brained scheme to look for lost treasure in Peru, against strong opposition from Michel's fiancée. Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven stars Brigitte Mira (Fear Eats the Soul) as a middle-aged housewife who is roused into revolutionary activity after her husband dies in an industrial accident. Based on a story by Asta Scheib, Fear of Fear features Fassbinder favourite Margit Carstensen (The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant) as the young mother plagued with feelings of anxiety and depression as she is left to spend her hours alone surrounded by her judgemental in-laws while her husband spends his days at work. Satan's Brew sees Fassbinder foray into riotous comedy, with Kurt Raab starring as a once famous poet stricken with writer's block who inadvertently assumes the persona of the prewar symbolist Stefan George. Product Features High definition digital transfers of The American Soldier, Gods of the Plague, Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven and Satan's Brew prepared by the Rainer Werner Fassbinder Foundation High Definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentations of The American Soldier, Gods of the Plague, Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven and Satan's Brew Original uncompressed PCM mono 1.0 sound for all films Optional English subtitles for all films Exclusive 140-page collectors booklet containing archive articles and new writing by Jonathan Rosenbaum, Eric Rentschler, David Jenkins, Margaret Deriaz and Earl Jackson. DISC ONE The American Soldier & The Niklashausen Journey Audio commentary by critic Tony Rayns on The American Soldier Audio commentary by critic Olaf Möller on The Niklashausen Journey Fassbinder Shoots Film No 8, a 1971 television documentary by Michael Ballhaus and Dieter Buchmann on Rainer Werner Fassbinder filming The American Soldier Man in the Shadow, an exclusive new in-depth interview with Fassbinder's collaborator Michael Fengler Freedom or Death!, an exclusive new interview with Michael König on The Niklashausen Journey DISC TWO Gods of the Plague & Rio Das Mortes Alter Ego: Harry Baer on Rainer Werner Fassbinder, a 40-minute interview with the star of Gods of the Plague Taking Off, an exclusive new interview with Michael König on Rio Das Mortes Original theatrical trailer for Gods of the Plague DISC THREE Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven & Fear of Fear Audio commentary by critic Olaf Möller on Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven alternate ending New interviews with Renate Leiffer, assistant director on Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven and Fear of Fear New interview with writer Asta Scheib on Fear of Fear Play It Again, Rainer! Fassbinder's Musical Obsessions, a new video essay by Margaret Deriaz on the use of music in Fassbinder's films. DISC FOUR Satan's Brew Audio commentary by critic Tony Rayns The Culture Industry Needs Something Like Me: Views of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, a 1976 documentary portrait of the director by Gert Ellinghaus Fassbinder: Love Without Demands, Christian Braad Thomsen's feature-length 2015 documentary portrait of his friend Fassbinder and the people who worked with him. Original theatrical trailer

• I Only Want You To Love Me | DVD | (23/04/2012) from £8.99   |  Saving you £7.00 (43.80%)   |  RRP £15.99

  I Only Want You To Love Me (Ich will doch nur, da ihr mich liebt) ‘The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.’ Henry David ThoreauConstruction worker Peter recounts his sorry tale from prison. Kind and hard working he builds his parents a house. They reciprocate with emotional abuse. He goes to Munich to work, bringing his wife who is soon pregnant. He works hard, they buy things on credit. He tries to fill the emotional void with material goods but his spending habits lead him into a spiral of debt and pressures mount. Finally he snaps. Made for German television in 1976, during a pause from filming feature Satan’s Brew, I Only Want You To Love Me is based on a true account taken from For Life (Lebenslaenglich), a book of interviews edited by Klaus Antes and Christiane Erhardt. Made when Fassbinder was going through a professional crisis I Only Want You To Love Me is a very personal reflection of his own childhood and adolescence. Extras: Documentary ‘Of Love and Constraints’ (60 minutes) Image Gallery

• Fontane - Effi Briest | DVD | (17/10/2011) from £14.98   |  Saving you £-1.99 (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  In the nineteenth century, seventeen year old Effi Briest is married to the older Baron von Instetten and moves into a house, that she believes has a ghost, in a small isolated Baltic town. She soon bears a daughter, Annie, and hires the lapsed Catholic Roswitha to look after her. Effi is lonely when her husband is away on business, so she spends time riding and walking along the shore with Major Crampas. Instetten is promoted to Ministerial Councillor and the family moves to Berlin, where Effi enjoys the social life. Six years later, the Baron is given letters from Crampas to Effi that convince him that they had an affair. He feels obliged to challenge Crampas to a duel and banish Effi from the house.Nominated for the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival in 1974.

• The Merchant Of Four Seasons | DVD | (07/08/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Famed German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder typically portrays aspects of the human struggle using an unwavering style that is often difficult to watch but provides a refreshingly raw and honest narrative perspective. Merchant Of Four Seasons is an engaging close-up portrait of a downtrodden fruit seller named Hans. Full of hope after serving with the Foreign Legion Hans becomes a police officer--only to be fired for an indiscretion with a prostitute humiliating himself and his family. Hungry for a piece of the economic boom of the 1950s Hans begins selling produce from a cart much to the dismay of his class-conscious family. Saddled with a shrewish wife Hans derives most of his pleasure from drink and flirting with a former girlfriend whom he truly loves. However when he hires a former Foreign Legion friend to help with his business things suddenly take an unfortunate turn making Hans obsolete in the process. The Merchant Of Four Seasons was a turning point in Fassbinder's career marking his entry into the international arena and the subsequent scrutiny of his notorious private life

• Lola | DVD | (03/07/2017) from £8.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Set in a small West German town in 1957, where, with the help of the Economic Miracle, a booming economy is generating a new sense of optimism. In the town brothel, Villa Fink, Lola (Barbara Sukowa), a young high-class prostitute with a zest for life, is the star of the show. Her favourite client is the influential developer Schuckert (Mario Adorf), who enjoys spending time at Villa Fink with city officials important to his construction business. When Von Bohm (Armin Mueller-Stahl), an upright, energetic building commissioner with a liberal, social-democratic outlook, arrives in the town, he falls in love with Lola without being aware where she works by night. Although he is shocked when he learns of her true identity, he nevertheless marries her to the satisfaction of all concerned. Ultimately neither Lola, Von Bohm nor Schuckert are really concerned with what has happened in the past or the morality of their decisions the main thing is that they get what they want. Fassbinder himself said in 1980 that THE MARRIAGE OF MARIA BRAUN and LOLA are films about the country as it is today. To understand the present, what a country has and will become, one needs to understand the whole story. The BRD Trilogy, which also includes VERONIKA VOSS, represents RWF's attempt to create an overall picture of West Germany at the time, its double moral standards, and the hazards and dangers these implied.