Gerd Weiss Movies
- 1992
Since the lead comedian in this film has numerous devoted fans in Germany, it was a guaranteed box-office draw in that country. However, foreign reviewers were less inclined to overlook the clumsy writing and gross, even offensive, humor (some of it homophobic) of the movie. The story concerns the efforts of a man (Dieter Hallervorden) who made his living as a comedian in the former East Germany who hopes to repeat his success in the newly reunified Berlin while he looks for his daughter, whom he hasn't seen for years. His former stage partner owns a phony investment firm which is designed to milk the savings from unsuspecting East Germans, and his wife is desperate to get into the comedian's pants. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dieter Hallervorden
- 1989
While strolling through the Tuileries, Catherine de Medici's lovely palace and its grounds in the heart of Paris, Marie (Beate Jensen) meets Peter (Stephane Ferrara), a handsome man whom she instantly gets involved with. He has warned her that he sometimes kills women for the pleasure of it, but despite that evidence of a truly twisted mind, she embarks on a passionate affair with him which is graphically depicted onscreen. When he actually kills a woman whom they happen to meet, she helps him cover up the deed. Is she actually turned on by this mayhem? It is difficult to know, but after the murder she witnesses, she does belatedly begin to take some steps to protect herself from this monster. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stephane Ferrara, Beate Jensen, (more)
- 1985
Meant as a commentary on what can go wrong (and right) in filming documentaries in a foreign locale, director Peter Przygodda has almost demonstrated some of his criticisms in the configuration of his own film. When a female director -- a rare entity statistically speaking -- takes her crew to the town of Salvador in Brazil to do a documentary on the site, everything goes wrong. She is not well-armed with a script and does not have enough authority to keep things going smoothly -- though her crew is not the best either. As circumstances go from bad to worse, she visits a local clairvoyant who lets her in on a secret -- enabling some of the mess to start clearing up a bit.
~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gila Von Weitershausen
- 1984
Although classed as a documentary, this look at the illicit, explicit side of night life in West Berlin spends enough time in the brothels and bedrooms of middle-class Berliners to satisfy the voyeur, without bothering to add any commentary that might actually provide a direction for the sequence of unlinked vignettes. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- 1983
When Chris (Rolf Zacher) is behind on his rent and all the other monthly bills as well, his solution is to steal a car and go out for a "joy-ride." Along the way he picks up two new cohorts who are equally bent on trashing the world, and the trio runs into a stroke of luck when they spot an East German car -- with the horsepower of a lawn mower -- loaded with money for transfer across the border and chugging its way along the road. Fate seems to have cast wealth at the feet of the trio just for the taking, as they bumble their way into a robbery that will nevertheless end in tragedy. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rolf Zacher
- 1981
This is the second comedy made by director Adolf Winkelmann about societal dropouts in the Ruhr industrial valley. Katlewski (Delle Quandt) has an acerbic way of pinpointing the buttoned-down minds of fellow workers who conform without question to their class-imposed parameters. Katlewski has had it with his wife who cannot let any neighbor surpass her in material gewgaws, and he has had it with his job as a coal miner as well -- quitting one day by just walking out. To survive, he finds odd jobs anywhere -- driving trucks, tending bars -- but he finally has a chance to find some gratification in life. He not only develops a relationship with a girlfriend who shares his views and understands him, but he craftily lifts enough money from a fat-cat who needs pruning anyway and pays off the debts his wife had accumulated for him. Perhaps Katlewski will be on another track entirely as he heads back to the miner's job he had recently abandoned. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Hermann Lause
- 1978
In this comedy, when young Atzi, Lutz and Sulli are laid off from their extremely technical jobs in a Dortmund factory, the likelihood of their finding similar work is pretty remote. Instead, they steal a broken-down moving van with bad brakes and hare around the countryside along with a girl who hitchhikes a ride from them. This youthful film was a box-office hit in Germany at the time of its release. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
