Vitus Zeplichal Movies

Dr. Crusius is a dour judge who manages to alienate an entire legal community with his arrogance and ever-smoldering anger. Abel is a freewheeling, hotshot young attorney who uses unconventional methods to win his cases. This German courtroom drama chronicles what happens when the two are thrown together in a difficult situation. Abel is first seen helping a client beat a traffic ticket in Crusius' court. The humorless judge (a sore loser) is less than pleased and gives Abel a stern lecture. The two meet again when the judge is suddenly accused of murdering a young prostitute. All the evidence seems clear cut. More trouble for the old judge comes when all those he has alienated get revenge by refusing to represent him. Unfortunately for young Abel, he is given no choice. Before he can do anything though, the attorney must learn the carefully guarded truth about the judge. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A sailor learns to take, and give, it like a man in this surrealistic adaptation of writer and thief Jean Genet's novel Querelle de Brest by avant-garde German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. In a colorful brothel in the port of Brest, proprietor Nono (Gunther Kaufmann) is known for wagering with his customers. Win a throw of the dice, and they get to make love with his wife, Lysiane (Jeanne Moreau); lose, and they must take it from behind by Nono himself. One day, Lysiane reads the tarot for her lover, Robert (Hanno Poschl), and learns in the cards of his intense passion for his brother, Querelle (Brad Davis). Querelle himself soon arrives, and the brothers enact a bizarre greeting halfway between a hug and a wrestling match. Querelle, it seems, is looking for partners in a drug deal; Robert points him in the right direction. An argument about the merits of sex between men soon leads Querelle to murder his fellow smuggler, Vic (Dieter Schidor). Back at the whorehouse, Querelle loses on purpose to Nono and finds he has a taste for passive gay sex. Meanwhile, fellow sailor Gil, who looks exactly like Querelle's brother (and is played by the same actor), murders one of his compatriots after the brute publicly impugns his manhood. Wanted by the police for both his own crime and Querelle's, Gil goes on the lam. Querelle soon crashes his hideout, and an intense bond develops between the two murderers -- a friendship that will lead Querelle to the greatest love, and the greatest treachery, of his life. Director Fassbinder was in the process of editing Querelle when he died of a drug overdose in June 1982. Gunther Kaufmann, who plays Nono, was Fassbinder's ex-lover; the film is dedicated to another former lover, El Hedi Ben Salem, the news of whose suicide had just reached the director. Critically derided even by many of Fassbinder's admirers, Querelle earned a Golden Raspberry award for Worst "Original" Song for "Each Man Kills the Thing He Loves," an Oscar Wilde poem set to music by Peer Raben and sung repeatedly by Jeanne Moreau. Moreau had previously starred in Mademoiselle, a Tony Richardson effort co-scripted by Genet. Look for Frank Ripploh, another pioneering German director, in a cameo. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide

Rainer Werner Fassbinder directs this bleak morality tale about a young Bavarian bricklayer who longs for love. Raised in a rigid, remote household and married to an emotionally distant woman, everyone in his life seems indifferent to his suffering. His life takes a further unfortunate turn when, while blind drunk, he accidentally kills a bartender, thinking it was his father. This film was made for German television and not released abroad until 1994. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

Based on Martin Walser's modern classic novel Das Unhell, this German film is much shorter than director Peter Fleischmann's original six-hour version. The book was notable for its complexity, psychological precision, and poetic imagery. The many-layered story concerns how a small town responds to the stresses of modern living: the political changes, social changes, and personal problems which change the nature of their once secure world forever. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide