Fear Eats The Soul

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Film Description

This tale of the prejudices faced when a middle-aged cleaning lady falls in love with and marries a young Arab immigrant worker is a startling, bitter study of moral hypocrisy. Heavily influenced by Douglas Sirk's masterpiece All That Heaven Allows, Fear Eats The Soul features the famous scene where the cleaning lady's son kicks in the television screen to express his disgust.

Film Information

DVD Extras

'Fassbinder In Hollywood' documentary; A conversation with Fassbinder; 'The City Tramp' short film; Interview with director Todd Haynes; Trailer; Film notes.

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Review by Howard Schumann on 7th February 2006

Ali (El Hedi ben Salem) is a fortyish Moroccan auto mechanic living in Germany who feels estranged from his culture. Emmi Kurowski (Brigette Mira), who is close to sixty, is a lonely cleaning lady who lost her husband many years ago and finds the outlets for companionship very limited. Ali: Fear Eats the Soul by German master Rainer Werner Fassbinder is a simple and direct statement of love between an older woman and a younger man and also a biting commentary on the mentality of prejudice and the state of German society during a period of economic resurgence.

Emmi is an innately good person. They are drawn to each other out of a desperate need for love but as they see more of each other, they are subject to increasing hostility from nosy neighbors, co-workers, and members of Emmi's family. With limited dialogue, the camerawork enhances the feeling of isolation with wide shots that render the couple vulnerable to the stares of neighbors, family, waiters, and bar owners. As the relationship hits a rough spot, Ali longs for his native food that Emmi cannot or will not cook and turns to the owner of the local bar for sex and Couscous.

After a brief period of separation, they return to the bar where they first met as the film takes an unexpected turn. Brigette Mira turns in a solid performance as the lonely old woman, giving her the strength of character to withstand all of life's rejections. El Hedi ben Salem is magnificent as the strong stoic African who is able to give of himself to a very different kind of partner. Filled with the contradictions of German society in the 70s, Ali: Fear Eats the Soul is a poignant, honest, and revealing work of art.

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Article - "Rainer Werner Fassbinder: A Brief Introduction" by Alex Davidson
Friday 31st August 2007

Fassbinder is one of the most ruthless observers of human nature the cinema has ever known. The best-known of the directors who flourished during the New German Cinema movement, his extraordinary output – 41 films in a 13-year period – almost certainly helped contrib...  View article in full

Article - "Humanity is What Matters: An Appreciation of Rainer Werner Fassbinder" by Christoph Michel
Friday 5th October 2007

Throughout the 1970s, Fassbinder seemed to be everywhere. Naturally, you'll say, with him filming at breakneck pace a new film would be along every few months, but that was not all, not by a long shot. He constantly wrote or directed stage plays both in big houses an...  View article in full

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Alex Davidson's Films Of The Year 2006 by Alex Davidson

It's been a great year for DVD releases, and I have discovered many new films that I had never heard of before, such as Fantastic Planet, which are among the best things I've seen all year. Many just missed the shortlist, as I've been so spoilt for choice!

Political films by Abhijeet Ranadive

These films discuss the politics of their times - sometimes in a very overt fashion that may be termed propaganda, but many of them express a political point of view through a human journey - the journey that the protagonists go through in the film.

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