German Cinema
The devastation of World War One left Germany's budding film industry, like much of Europe, in tatters. But necessity being the mother of invention, German Expressionism was born. Relying heavily on symbolism and shadow rather than elaborate and costly sets, films like 'The Cabinet of Dr Caligari' are still studied by film students the world over. By the mid-1920s, the industry was getting back on its feet and great directors like Fritz Lang and FW Murnau were making their early masterpieces. However the onset of Nazism and the impending war led many of Germany's artists, including filmmakers, to flee to the U.S. Fritz Lang, Billy Wilder, Douglas Sirk, Karl Freund and many more all continued their careers in America while the German film industry virtually disappeared. It was not unitl the '60s and '70s that new talents emerged. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Werner Herzog, Viktor Schlondorff and Wim Wenders revitalised German cinema and today international hits such as 'Run Lola Run' and 'Goodbye Lenin!' assure us it is here to stay.
Right: 'Run Lola Run'
In The Face Of Crime (2010)
8/10
Starring: Max Riemelt, Ronald Zehrfeld, Mark Ivanir
The worlds of a young Russo-German cop who investigates within the Berlin Russian mafia milieu and a young Russian woman who is forced into prostituti... Read more
Aguirre, The Wrath Of God (Blu-ray) (1972)
7.9/10
Director: Werner Herzog
Starring: Klaus Kinski, Ruy Guerra, Del Negro, Helena Rojo
Based on the journals of Brother Gaspar de Carvajal, and tells a hallucinatory tale of Spanish colonialists searching for El Dorado, the legendary cit... Read more
The Red Baron (Blu-ray) (2008)
6.4/10
Director: Nikolai Mullerschon
Starring: Matthias Schweighofer, Lena Headey, Til Schweiger, Joseph Fiennes
Baron Manfred von Richthofen (Matthias Schweighofer) is the most feared and celebrated pilot of the German air force during World War I, eventually ra... Read more
Phoenix (Blu-ray) (2014)
7.3/10
Director: Christian Petzold
Starring: Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf
This evocative and haunting drama, set in rubble-strewn Berlin in 1945, is like no other film about postWorld War II Jewish-German identity. After su... Read more
Kokowääh (2011)
6.3/10
Director: Til Schweiger
Starring: Numan Acar, Meret Becker, Til Schweiger
Henry is a handsome screenwriter who is trying to win the heart of the woman he truly loves. His plans are interrupted when he finds Magdalena, a litt... Read more
Longing for New Zealand (2009)
4.9/10
Director: Michael Keusch
Starring: Vicky Haughton, Dietrich Mattausch
Upon making a mysterious inheritance in New Zealand, New York publisher Paige Duvall travels to the Antipodes to learn what this is all about. There s... Read more
Faust (Blu-ray) (2011)
6.6/10
Director: Alexander Sokurov
Starring: Hanna Schygulla, Georg Friedrich, Johannes Zeiler, Isolda Dychauk, Anton Adasins...
Aleksandr Sokurov directs this German-language adaptation of the classic tale about a man who sells his soul to the Devil. The story, woven into the f... Read more
Balls (2004)
6.8/10
Director: Sherry Hormann
Starring: Eileen Eilender
Guys and Balls (German: Männer wie wir, literally Men like us, UK title : Balls) is a 2004 sports comedy/romance film by German American director Sher... Read more
The High Crusade (1994)
5.1/10
Director: Roland Emmerich
Starring: John Rhys-Davies, Rick Overton
Roland Emmerich (Stargate, Independence Day, and Godzilla) brings you John Rhys-Davies in a Monty Pythonesque tale of a band of Crusaders who find the... Read more
Fox and His Friends (1975)
7.8/10
Director: Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Starring: Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Peter Chatel, Harry Bar
A down-and-out, down on his luck homosexual carnival worker wins the lottery and along with it, some new friends. Unfortunately, a charming, scheming... Read more