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Format: VHS
Dec 1988
Not Rated
Recording Mode: (unknown)
120 min. |
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Details
Movie Description
Set against the backdrop of Nazi Germany, "Despair" is an emotionally rich & stirring account of a factory owner's frightening descent into madness. This is Fassbinder at his finest. Tom Stoppard's screenplay from Vladimir Nabakov's novel.
Synopsis
The great and prolific German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder made his English-language debut with this film written by playwright Tom Stoppard -- and based on a novel by Vladimir Nabokov.
"Despair" takes a painstaking and penetrating look at the psychology of a Russian emigré living in Paris in the 1920s. Herman has become so distanced and alienated from the world around him that he even imagines himself standing outside his own body, "watching himself" going about his business.
Then he meets a man who, in fact, is his physical double, and Herman concocts a murderous scheme that will assure his financial security for good.
Film Notes
Shown at the Cannes Film Festival (in competition) May 20, 1978.
Color by Eastmancolor.
German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder's first film in English.
Industry Reviews
"...Fassbinder's elegant, comic, purposely precious film version [of Nabokov's book] adapted by the playwright Tom Stoppard, who has been inspired Nabokov to attain new heights of splendid lunacy, and acted by Dirk Bogarde, who gives one of the wittiest performances of his entire career..."
New York Times - Vincent Canby (02/16/1979)
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