Rio das Mortes – 1971
Director
Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Writer
Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Cast
Hanna Schygulla
Michael König
Günther Kaufmann

Review by Zetes

Well worth checking out,

Excellent early Fassbinder about two shiftless young men who decide, seemingly on the spur of a moment, that the next big step in their lives will be an extended expedition for treasure in Peru’s Rio das Mortes region. One of their fiancées (Hanna Schygulla, as gorgeous and as great as ever) finds the notion stupid and wants to put a stop to it.

It’s a droll comedy and has a ton of great sequences. This is the first film in a Fassbinder bender I’m going on. I’m planning on seeing all of the films of his that have recently been released on DVD. I’ve been thinking a lot about this particular author lately. I don’t think that enough time has passed since his untimely death to allow his career to be taken into proper perspective. Fassbinder reminds me a lot of Rohmer, Ozu, Godard and Bresson. He’s in his own little world in his films (a world which changed a lot in the 13 or so years during which he was active), and a lot of people are still misunderstanding it as overly theatrical, or stilted, or otherwise.

The more films one sees by him, the more one gets adjusted to this universe. I think Rio das Mortes is best appreciated by Fassbinder’s fans, and is unlikely to make any new converts (start with Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, Fox and His Friends, and The Marriage of Maria Braun).