Monday, May 12, 2014

Despair (1978)


New Line Cinema
Directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb
(Blu-ray, Olive Films)

Dirk Bogarde is the owner of a failing chocolate factory in the early days of Nazi Germany. He has a strained relationship with his wife and her artist "cousin", who he suspects are having an affair. He concocts a murder scheme in which he fakes his own death by switching identities with a man he meets at a cafe. After carrying out the plan, he hides out in a small town in Switzerland where the police eventually catch up with him. Despite a fine performance by Bogarde and a screenplay by Tom Stoppard adapted from as story by Nabokov, this is murky and aloof, working neither as murder mystery or period drama. Superb photography by Michael Ballhaus, however, saves it from being a complete waste of time.

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