#77: The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant
Part of the Top 150 Films series
In many ways, Petra von Kant is a prototypical Fassbinder joint: a study in sexuality and emotional masochism with an emphasis on tightly blocked tableau and a eerie sense of surrealism. There’s something about this film, however, that elevates it above Sirk-pastiches and those films in which he acts. The formal magnificence is undeniable; this may be the most stunning use of a single small set in cinema history. The frames seem to utilise both bodies and architecture as a means for expression, interested in the abstract shapes which seem to continually form between and around the broken, damaged characters. And there might not be a more damaged, more human Fassbinder character than Petra von Kant. As portrayed by Margit Carstensen, Petra is as brash as any stereotypical ‘actorly’ performance of a similar timbre, but with subtleties seeping through the mess of contradictions inherent in her psyche. An astonishing revelation.
