Hannes Gromball Movies

This fast-paced black comedy by wunderkind director Rainer Werner Fassbinder follows the frantic efforts of a starving and confused writer, Walter Kranz (Kurt Raab) to beg, borrow or steal enough money to survive on, and at the same time make some sense of his confusing life. Unable to write enough to keep his publisher's royalty advances coming, he seeks out a woman he imagines is a prostitute and interviews her for material. He is also inspired to utter some poetry, which his brassy, outspoken wife identifies as coming from the famous homosexuality-advocating mystical German poet, Stefan George. This inspires Walter to take a closer look at the "gay scene," and he quickly becomes a sort of celebrity there. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

A technical designer enjoys a comfortable life with his wife and child. He has the approval of his boss and is in good health except for smoking too much according to his doctor. His wife is visited by a girlfriend one Sunday afternoon. The man is bored watching television and grabs a chandelier and kills the conversing women and his child. In a chilling display of nonchalance, he contemplates his own death by hanging in this disturbing feature. This film was the fourth for director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

Gods of the Plague (Gotter der Pest) is one of several German films directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder under his pseudonym of Franz Walsch. That's Fassbinder, however, playing the small role of a buyer of pornography. The main story involves a pair of two-bit hoods who spend most of the film one-upping each other with a brace of scheming females. Their dreary life of crime comes to a spectacular head in a shoot-out at a supermarket. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi