Liebeskonzil

Liebeskonzil

1982 · 92 min · ★ 9.0 · Drama

Oskar Panizza’s The Council of Love (1895) is a blasphemous play set in 1495, during the first recorded outbreak of syphilis, which Panizza satirically presents as the punishment from Satan for sexually active humans. As a result, Panizza was imprisoned for obscenity. Schroeter alternates scenes from the Panizza’s work with a dramatization of his trial, presenting the play as an expressionist spectacle performed by actors wearing exaggerated makeup who gesture and grimace grotesquely. The film thus forms a bridge between Schroeter’s use of tableaux in his early experiments with the political urgency of his 1980s films. On the eve of the AIDS crisis, Schroeter is presciently worried about disease as an excuse for governmental repression and the oppression of sexuality. - Harvard Film Archive

Directed by Werner Schroeter · Written by Roberto Lerici

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Cast

Antonio Salines Teufel / Dr. Panizza
Magdalena Montezuma Doppelzeugin
Kurt Raab Gerichtspräsident
Renzo Rinaldi Gottvater
Margit Carstensen Staatsanwältin
Heinrich Giskes Verteidiger
Agnès Nobecourt Maria
Roberto Tesconi Christus
Lauro Versari Cherubim
Patrizia La Fonte Selbstmörder-Engel
Guido Polito 2. Engel
Kristina van Eyck Agrippina

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Liebeskonzil

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