BEWARE OF A HOLY WHORE Movie Review

Warnung Vor Einer Helligen Nutte

The holy whore of the title refers to the combined villain, hero, and seductress of the story: the cinema itself. Made as a response to a particularly difficult film shoot that Fassbinder experienced (the picture was called Whity), Beware of a Holy Whore finds cast and crew at a seaside resort, simmering with anger, sexual anxiety, and seething with repressed resentment—though it doesn't stay repressed for long. A tough, leather-jacketed Lou Castel stands in for Fassbinder, though Fassbinder himself, a remarkably magnetic though generally creepy presence, performs in the film as well. The sullen star of the picture within the picture is none other than European cult figure and American expatriate Eddie Constantine, whose square-jawed, pockmarked presence is always in itself a commentary on Europe's eternal love/hate relationship with the American cinema. Regulars Hanna Schygulla and Ulli Lommel are here as well, completing what is probably best described as Day for Night without the day.

NEXT STOP … The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant, Passion (1982), Two Weeks in Another Town

1970 103m/C GE Lou Castel, Eddie Constantine, Hanna Schygulla, Marquard Bohm, Ulli Lommel, Margarethe von Trotta, Kurt Raab, Ingrid Caven, Werner Schroeter, Rainer Werner Fassbinder; D: Rainer Werner Fassbinder; W: Rainer Werner Fassbinder; C: Michael Ballhaus; M: Peer Raben. VHS ORI