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Marlene’s Pistol and Brady’s Rule: Elements of Mystification and Indeterminacy in Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Film Die bitteren Tränen der Petra von Kant
Author(s) -
White John,
Wgite Ann
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
german life and letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.1
H-Index - 12
eISSN - 1468-0483
pISSN - 0016-8777
DOI - 10.1111/1468-0483.00175
Subject(s) - indeterminacy (philosophy) , distancing , philosophy , formalism (music) , scholarship , art , art history , interpreter , literature , epistemology , covid-19 , computer science , law , medicine , infectious disease (medical specialty) , musical , disease , pathology , political science , programming language
This article attempts to explore unrealistic features of Rainer Werners Fassbinder’s most mannered and formalist film from a fresh perspective. Whereas Fassbinder scholarship has hitherto tended to see the work as an early example of the author’s imposition of Brechtian ’anti‐illusionistic’ distancing devices upon melodramatic material, it is argued here that many of the elements of stylisation and formalism in this particular film are not being deployed for Brechtian reasons. A number of key elements of mystification and indeterminacy are explored to suggest that the film is more enigmatic than many interpreters have suggested; and these elements, which were rarely present in the original stage version of Die bitteren Tränen der Petra von Kant are shown to create a series of unresolved enigmas and general mood of eeriness. Particular attention is paid to the visual importance of dolls, tailor’s dummies and Marlene’s pistol, as well as the body‐language in certain sequences. The central relationship between Petra von Kant and Marlene is re‐examined within this framework.