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Licensor Information
Rainer Werner Fassbinder Foundation
Directed by: Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Featuring: Margit Carstensen, Hanna Schygulla, Katrin Schaake, Eva Mattes, Gisela Fackeldey, Irm Hermann
In the early 1970s, Rainer Werner Fassbinder discovered the American melodramas of Douglas Sirk and was inspired by them to begin working in a new, more intensely emotional register. One of the first and best-loved films of this period in his career is The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant, which balances a realistic depiction of tormented romance with staging that remains true to the director’s roots in experimental theater. This unforgettable, unforgiving dissection of the imbalanced relationship between a haughty fashion designer (Margit Carstensen) and a beautiful but icy ingenue (Hanna Schygulla)—based, in a sly gender reversal, on the writer-director’s own desperate obsession with a young actor—is a true Fassbinder affair, featuring exquisitely claustrophobic cinematography by Michael Ballhaus and full-throttle performances by an all-female cast.
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Technical Specifications
Format:
Blu-ray
Disc:
BD-50 (1 Disc)
Total: 1 Disc
Regions:
A (Blu-ray)
Aspect Ratio:
1.37:1
Audio Options:
German PCM Mono 1.0
Subtitles:
English
Supplements
Types of Supplements Included: Interview, Television Program, Poster Insert
- New interviews with Michael Ballhaus and actors Margit Carstensen, Eva Mattes, Katrin Schaake, and Hanna Schygulla
- New interview with film scholar Jane Shattuc
- Role Play: Women on Fassbinder, a 1992 German television documentary by Thomas Honickel featuring interviews with Carstensen, Schygulla, and actors Irm Hermann and Rosel Zech
- An essay by critic Peter Matthews
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