Tuesday, January 24, 2017

Angst (Fear) - Movie Review

1983. Angst is an Austrian film. It follows a psychopath who has been just released from jail. The first thing he does is after his release is go to drink espresso where he watches two flirty girls at the coffee shop. He barely controls an urge to do nasty things to them but the way he chews on his sausage is enough evidence on what he plans to do. The cinematography is brilliant. You want him to stop chewing on that sausage - there's so much violence in that act.

Next he gets into a taxi and finds the driver resembling his first girl friend. Once again he removes his shoe lace to strangle her but she senses it and gets away. Our man is constantly talking to himself in his mind and telling us what he is thinking all the time. He then finds a home, empty, and breaks in. He finds a grown man, an invalid who is also mentally challenged. Soon come an elderly lady and her good looking daughter. When they find out about the broken window our chap becomes uncontrollably excited at the prospect of killing them. He drowns the man first, smothers the old lady, stabs the young lady and then rapes her in the sticky drying blood. Then he takes all their bodies and dumps them in the car and heads back to the coffee shop again thrilled at the idea that he could scare his next victims with the sight of the bodies in the car boot. He gets caught by the cops while there owing to a small accident he gets into in his excitement.

What's brilliant about the movie is the pace at which it takes us along with the psychopath. The entire duration might not have been longer than the actual time - 90 minutes perhaps - so you are with him all the time almost. It's sickeningly crazy, the close ups, the background talk, the music and riveting. Erwin Leder in the lead role is chilling as the psychopath. Obviously not one to watch if you don't have a stomach for this kind of stuff but once it gets going it grips you - the guy is so crazy you just don't know what he will do next and why.

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