Word: alexanderplatz
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...perhaps ironic that Rainer Werner Fassbinder's Berlin Alexanderplatz opens with a man's release from prison, and chronicles the difficulty he encounters in adjusting to the outside world. After taking part in a 15-hour marathon showing of the 1979 made-for-TV miniseries, one can certainly relate to protagonist Franz Biberkopf's temporary detachment from reality...
...spite of its admittedly imposing length, Berlin Alexanderplatz manages to maintain an audience's attention, mainly by presenting a superbly crafted plot and highly symbolic cinematography. The film, composed of 13 parts and an epilogue, details Biberkopf's unsuccessful attempts to lead an honest and "decent" life following his release. It is simultaneously a story of failed and successful relationships and occupations, flirtations with Nazi sentiments, dealings with villainous small-time gangsters and bouts with alcoholism and insanity...
...would presume that, in any film of this length, a certain degree of repetition of plot developments and themes is inevitable. In fact, since Berlin Alexanderplatz deals as much with psychological devastation as it does with romance and criminal intrigue, it is to be expected that the protagonist should, in proper Freudian fashion, relive certain events of his life over and over again, seeking control over events otherwise relegated to the unchangeable past. Fassbinder brutally exploits the technique of flashback in scenes in which Biberkopf recalls the murder of his girlfriend. Fassbinder offers different voice-overs in each reenactment, which...
...morning of May 5, some 400 people gathered in a park near Berlin's Alexanderplatz and scattered flowers at the base of the Marx-Engels memorial to commemorate the 173rd birthday of the philosopher who prophesied the ultimate triumph of proletarian revolution. Karl Marx, proclaimed a speaker, should not be blamed for the errors of the former Socialist Unity Party, which for 40 years had ruled East Germany. WE'LL DO BETTER NEXT TIME read a slogan someone had chalked at the base of the memorial. WE'RE NOT GUILTY said another. A third graffito was sardonically realistic...
...this night she is one of only half a dozen men and women in the disco on the 37th floor of the Hotel Stadt Berlin in Alexanderplatz -- the modernistic public square where most of the demonstrations in East Berlin for this new, democratic way of life have taken place. "People are exhausted," says the bartender. "It is too much to comprehend...