This is "Bolwieser", also known as "The Stationmaster's Wife", a West German German-language film from 1977 and let me start by saying that there is one version that runs for over 3 hours and another that runs for slightly under 2 hours. I watched the latter. Here we have another work by filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder from the mid-1970s, his possibly most prolific phase. And it is another work by the infant terrible together with Kurt Raab, who appeared in many Fassbinder films. There are some more people playing major roles in here that Fassbinder used to work with regularly such as Volker Spengler, but not as many as usual for Fassbinder. This movie will have its 40th anniversary next year. Maybe you need to be a bit of a sadist in order to appreciate this film as Raab's character gets humiliated by everybody else in here from start to finish. This includes not only his colleagues and "friends" or the law, but most of all his wife played by Elisabeth Trissenaar who keeps cheating on him behind his back and even gets him to swear under oath at a court of law that he thinks she is faithful and you can already imagines who suffers the most from these legal consequences.
I like Fassbinder and I love Raab who I think is an amazing actor, which is why I managed to enjoy this film a lot. There were many scenes were you could just shake your head at how everybody acts towards Bolwieser, but there were also scenes where you could wonder to which extent he is responsible himself for the lack of respect he gets. I felt it almost never dragged and I am tempted to say that I would have liked to watch it for another hour in the long version and there is really not a better compliment for a film, even if it would certainly have been a less essential watch I guess. In terms of the visual side, costumes and sets are nicely established too, but that's almost a given for Fassbinder, who adapted the Oskar Maria Graf here. Ihe supporting characters do a fine job too. I may be a bit biased with my admiration for this film here and appreciation of Raab's performance because he is one of my favorites from his generation, but I do believe that people not familiar with Fassbinder or Raab can choose this one to get an insight into these people's careers. It is fairly easy to find access to and make a connection. I also think this film may make for a great duo watch together with the other Fassbinder/Raab collaboration I mentioned in the title. I give a thumbs-up here and recommend the watch. A fine example of how Germany also had to offer some great quality in terms of filmmaking from the 1970s against the big quantity of mediocre and trash films.
I like Fassbinder and I love Raab who I think is an amazing actor, which is why I managed to enjoy this film a lot. There were many scenes were you could just shake your head at how everybody acts towards Bolwieser, but there were also scenes where you could wonder to which extent he is responsible himself for the lack of respect he gets. I felt it almost never dragged and I am tempted to say that I would have liked to watch it for another hour in the long version and there is really not a better compliment for a film, even if it would certainly have been a less essential watch I guess. In terms of the visual side, costumes and sets are nicely established too, but that's almost a given for Fassbinder, who adapted the Oskar Maria Graf here. Ihe supporting characters do a fine job too. I may be a bit biased with my admiration for this film here and appreciation of Raab's performance because he is one of my favorites from his generation, but I do believe that people not familiar with Fassbinder or Raab can choose this one to get an insight into these people's careers. It is fairly easy to find access to and make a connection. I also think this film may make for a great duo watch together with the other Fassbinder/Raab collaboration I mentioned in the title. I give a thumbs-up here and recommend the watch. A fine example of how Germany also had to offer some great quality in terms of filmmaking from the 1970s against the big quantity of mediocre and trash films.