THE MARRIAGE OF MARIA BRAUN Movie Review

Die Ehe der Maria Braun

Hanna Schygulla, Rainer Werner Fassbinder's discovery, is given the full-blown movie star treatment in Fassbinder's 1978 breakthrough film. She stars as a woman who refuses to accept the loss of her husband—a soldier in World War II—as a personal defeat, using every tool at her disposal (including those Dietrich-like legs of hers that appear on the film's celebrated poster) to reinvent herself following the Hitler years. Clearly designed to be a major statement about the sacrifices, rewards, and lessons that sprang from Germany's defeat and subsequent recovery. The Marriage of Maria Braun is, perhaps, more successful as a lush, juicy soap opera than as an instructive metaphor. As dynamic, funny, erotically charged, and symmetrically structured as it is. The Marriage of Maria Braun—perhaps the single best-known example of the New German Cinema—nevertheless feels less personal and passionate than Fassbinder's fifteen-and-a-half-hour Berlin Alexanderplatz or even his dark, doom-ridden, visionary Veronika Voss. As a display of Schygulla's talents, however, it remains a worthy and beautifully crafted showcase for one of the most talented performers in modern cinema.

NEXT STOP … Lili Marleen, Veronika Voss, Mommie Dearest

1979 (R) 120m/C GE Hanna Schygulla, Klaus Lowitsch, Ivan Desny, Gottfried John, Gisela Uhlen; D: Rainer Werner Fassbinder; W: Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Peter Marthesheimer, Pea Frolich; C: Michael Ballhaus; M: Peer Raben. Berlin International Film Festival ‘79: Best Actress (Schygulla). VHS NYF, COL, GLV