Werner Schroeter | |
|---|---|
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| Born | (1945-04-07)7 April 1945 |
| Died | 12 April 2010(2010-04-12) (aged 65) Hesse, Germany |
| Occupation(s) | Film director Screenwriter Opera director |
| Years active | 1967–2008 |
Werner Schroeter (7 April 1945 – 12 April 2010) was aGerman film director, screenwriter, and opera director known for his stylistic excess.[1][2] Schroeter was cited byRainer Werner Fassbinder as an influence both on his own work and on German cinema at large.[3]
Schroeter started out as an underground filmmaker in 1967. Garnering a small cult following, the director also made his mark on the international festival circuit. Defying categorization, his films lie somewhere betweenavant-garde and art cinema.[4]Magdalena Montezuma was a German underground star that became his muse until her death in 1985. Other notable actors to star in his films include:Bulle Ogier,Carole Bouquet, andIsabelle Huppert.[3]
After attending the Film Festival atKnokke, Belgium in 1967, Schroeter made his first 8mm film,Maria Callas Portrait, that consisted of animated stills of Callas overlaid with the sound of her singing.[3]Eika Katappa was his first feature, which mixes pop and opera. The film was self-financed and won the Joseph von Sternberg prize for "the most idiosyncratic film" at the 1969Mannheim Film Festival.[5]
His "total cinema" films were predominantly produced by Das kleine Fernsehspiel ("The Little Television Play"), a small experimental department of the German public-service station. The company supported some of Schroeter's most controversial projects including:The Bomber Pilot (70),Salome (71),Macbeth (71), andGoldflocken (76).The Reign of Naples [it] marked the director's shift toward more plot-driven films, commenting: "it is much more radical to play with the content than with the aesthetics of the image. The era of independence is over. Our society has not fulfilled the promises hoped for around '68-'70".[6] The film won many prizes domestically and internationally and was his first commercial release.[3]
Schroeter had also worked in film as a producer, cinematographer, editor and actor. As an actor, he appeared in several films directed by his friendRainer Werner Fassbinder, includingBeware of a Holy Whore (1971), and a number of theatre productions. During the second half of the 1980s, Schroeter became widely known as a theater and opera director both in Germany and abroad, returning to filmmaking in 1990 withMalina, a literary adaptation starring Isabelle Huppert based onIngeborg Bachmann's novel. The film won the German Film Award in Gold.Deux also stars (and was written for) Huppert and premiered at Cannes in 2002, but did not get German distribution.
His1980 filmPalermo oder Wolfsburg, telling the story of aSicilianguest worker in Germany, won theGolden Bear at the30th Berlin International Film Festival,[7] while his1991 productionMalina was entered into that year'sCannes Film Festival.[8]
Although he is mainly known for elaborate and excessive camp fables, the director also made some hard-hitting documentaries includingSmiling Star (83) andFor Example, Argentina (83–85) about theMarcos regime in the Philippines and theLeopoldo Galtieri military dictatorship in Argentina, respectively.[9]
At the time of his death Schroeter had been organizing a photography exhibition with his art-dealer friend Christian Holzfuss featuring his own works, most of which were manipulated portraits of the many actresses with whom he had worked over the years. In 2011 a documentary about the director was made by Elfi Mikesch, a close friend and collaborator, entitledMondo Lux: The Visual Worlds of Werner Schroeter[3]
In 2016 he was awarded posthumously with theTraetta Prize for his work in the rediscovery of the roots of European music.
During the 1960s, Schroeter worked with German experimental film-maker and gay rights activist,Rosa von Praunheim.[10] Schroeter also worked as a theater and opera director, in Germany and abroad. In the late 1970s, Schroeter met Irish artistReginald Gray at a collection ofYves Saint Laurent in Paris. Gray painted a portrait of Schroeter.[11]
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