Alexander Kluge

[swo17]

Thanks to those that have responded--there are currently four of us. Let's say I'll take group buy participants for the next week or until meeting the shipping threshold, whichever comes first. Also, if anyone wants to add anything else to their order let me know. For instance, I think I want to pick up Batang West Side

EDIT: Recommendations for other titles from this label moved here

[denti alligator]

Alexander Kluge, 94, German film director much of whom's brilliant filmography is available through Edition Filmmusuem: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2026/m ... man-cinema

Dang! He was a giant in both film and literature. But he had a long life and was active up to the end. Incredible legacy.

[hearthesilence]

Would Occasional Work of a Female Slave be a good place to start? (I'm guessing it's never made it past DVD, i.e. SD-only for home viewing)?

[swo17]

Perhaps but be aware it contains some graphic abortion footage. I'd personally recommend Strongman Ferdinand

[knives]

I’ll second either that or Artists Under the Big Top.

[Aunt Peg]

I'm forever grateful to Edition Filmmusuem for releasing Kluge's work as prior to their releases I'd only ever seen Yesterday's Girl (1966), The Patriot (1979) & The Power of Emotion (1983) - which remains my all-time favourite Kluge film.

I also highly recommend Artists Under the Big Top, Strongman Ferdinand, Occasional Work of a Female Slave & Miscellaneous News.

For me a titan of New Wave Germany cinema and part of my personal top three along with Fassbinder & von Praunheim.

[colinr0380]

I'd highly recommend checking out zedz's thread on Kluge's films, which may be one of the highest points of the forum. It certainly inspired me to go to all of the faff of setting up a PayPal account back in the day just to be able to pick up the German Filmmuseum DVD set of Kluge's work.

[GaryC]

I haven't seen anything of his and other than that German DVD set don't think I've ever had an opportunity to. I posted about him in the Waning Art House Titans thread. In the 1960s, Yesterday Girl and Artistes at the Top of the Big Top: Disorientated were titles to conjure with, but neither has been on VHS or disc in the UK and I can't trace any TV showings other than The Patriot on Channel 4 in 1984, which I didn't see.Maybe, now he's passed, there could be some showings at least, maybe at the BFI Southbank in London?

[jlnight]

I haven't seen anything of his and other than that German DVD set don't think I've ever had an opportunity to. I posted about him in the Waning Art House Titans thread. In the 1960s, Yesterday Girl and Artistes at the Top of the Big Top: Disorientated were titles to conjure with, but neither has been on VHS or disc in the UK and I can't trace any TV showings other than The Patriot on Channel 4 in 1984, which I didn't see.Maybe, now he's passed, there could be some showings at least, maybe at the BFI Southbank in London?

I'll help you out - there was a second screening of The Patriot on Channel 4, in 1988. Meanwhile, Strongman Ferdinand apparently was broadcast on Southern TV in Jan 1981 as part of one of their Continental seasons. The only other thing that was broadcast was the multi-director film Germany in Autumn, again on Channel 4 in 1987, its sole screening.

[GaryC]

I haven't seen anything of his and other than that German DVD set don't think I've ever had an opportunity to. I posted about him in the Waning Art House Titans thread. In the 1960s, Yesterday Girl and Artistes at the Top of the Big Top: Disorientated were titles to conjure with, but neither has been on VHS or disc in the UK and I can't trace any TV showings other than The Patriot on Channel 4 in 1984, which I didn't see.Maybe, now he's passed, there could be some showings at least, maybe at the BFI Southbank in London?

I'll help you out - there was a second screening of The Patriot on Channel 4, in 1988. Meanwhile, Strongman Ferdinand apparently was broadcast on Southern TV in Jan 1981 as part of one of their Continental seasons. The only other thing that was broadcast was the multi-director film Germany in Autumn, again on Channel 4 in 1987, its sole screening.

I've just had a look. Strongman Ferdinand was billed as Ferdinand the Strong and was on Southern on 23 January 1981. I was then and am now on the border of what were Thames/LWT and Southern but generally got the London channels. And January 1981 was before I started watching foreign-language films in earnest on TV, let alone ones which started at 11.35pm on Friday nights. The listing I can see bills it as The Late, Late Show, which does seem to have been a home for foreign-language films: The 19-Year-Old's Plan (Japanese) was on the week before and Solo Sunny (East German) the week after.

[therewillbeblus]

Yesterday Girl is full of memorable bits and pieces, but there’s a particular sequence in the middle of the film that’s gob-smacking in its audacity and irreverence and might give you an idea of what you’re in for. In the course of about three minutes, we get the following shots, in sequence:
- A display of elaborately stylised police stunt-driving, sped up so that the headlights become blurred, spinning halos.
- A second pixillated shot of the police display, this time of marching in formation.
- Anita’s pious friend, last seen at the very beginning of the film, walking through a forest and spying something as she approaches the camera.
- A close-up of Anita, in the forest, holding up her palm, which is full of slime.
- An actor (not seen anywhere else in the film) declaiming a speech melodramatically at the camera.
- A white rabbit chomping on a carrot.
- Pan shot of a stretch of mud.
- Longer scene in which two men in a park (new to the film) offer a woman (ditto) the choice of which of her two children will undergo a lobotomy - it’s OK, you see, because she has a choice. They cart off her son.
- A shot of dozens of toy soldiers advancing in stop motion across a hilly landscape.
- A couple of extra shots of the toy soldiers in the landscape, this time unanimated, but caught with the camera circling around them.
- Sped-up footage of Anita running around a park, amongst other people who may be chasing her.
- An intertitle that reads: “Will yesterday come tomorrow?”
- More footage of Anita running through the park - now chased by the sinister lobotomising pair. She turns and fires a gun at them.
- Anita steps onto a table at which another woman is sitting and starts to walk towards us. She steps in her high heels on the woman’s thumb, which is crushed and explodes in a mess of blood and latex.

I really enjoyed this (my first Kluge.. where to go from here?!) but the sequence zedz describes is one of the most inspiring bits of experimentation I've seen in a film. Truly mesmerizing. I'm planning to check out Strongman Ferdinand next, but welcome any suggestions

[charal]

STRONGMAN is Kluge’s most ‘normal’ film. It is a deliberate attempt by Kluge to get wider exposure but the public didn't like it any more than his other more experimental (brain-twisting films) After this try OCCASIONAL WORK OF A SLAVE then ARTISTS AT THE BIG TOP.

STRONGMAN has its head-scratching moments due to consistent use of ellipses but the film has a consistent logic to it.

I got all the Kluge films from Germany years ago (Edition Filmmuseum) but avoided the video works. THE BLIND DIRECTOR is perhaps his most amusing film but that is open to debate.