Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven

The character of Mother Kusters is remarkable for several reasons. Although Fassbinder often has a tendency to allegorize his characters (albeit in fascinating ways), even as he does here, Emma Kusters (Brigitte Mira) is both a potent symbol of The Mother and, simultaneously, a flesh and blood woman. When so many of his characters, not to mention people in the real world, are destroyed by their rigidity, her willingness to explore new ideas - to incorporate an increasingly complex view of the social world, her family, and even herself - seems a genuine form of optimism.

The film's literary roots also connect with Fassbinder's aesthetic and political aims. Although he attributed its inspiration to an obscure story, the key cultural "mother" is Gorky's in his 1906 novel, Mother (an indomitable Russian peasant woman, after having her political consciousness raised through a family tragedy, joins the Russian revolution). It was also dramatized by Brecht, whose theories of how to engage the audience's mind as well as emotions were a crucial early influence on Fassbinder. But sure to raise the hackles of his Leftist predecessors, Fassbinder takes some hilarious jabs at Communists and anarchists, not to mention right-wing journalists. With so much humor, many people consider this an outright comedy.

But Fassbinder also raises many serious, and still-relevant, social issues - about the nature of mass media and politics - even as he returns to one of his perennial themes, exploitation. And although he satirizes most of the characters, except Mother Kusters, he never dehumanizes them. Take the photographer/reporter Niemeyer (Gottfried John). He is tall, lanky, almost vulture-like, yet he comes across as sincere and likeable, even as he wheedles the most intimate details out of Emma Kusters - and even beds her crudely self-promoting daughter Corinna (Ingrid Caven). It would be easy to reduce Niemeyer, for cheap laughs, to a one-dimensional stereotype. But Fassbinder gives him considerable emotional, even moral, depth. And he is defended by Mother Kusters herself: "It's his job to create sensations. Everybody has to make a living." Fassbinder is merciless, and witty, at condemning the institution; but he ekes out some sympathy for the employees.

Fassbinder uses visual design to make his themes still more complex and involving. He begins not with an expected establishing shot, to show us where we are, but by holding on a closeup of Mother Kusters' hands, as she screws a round brown part into a small white plastic box, one after another after another. Eventually he reveals that she is working not in a factory but at her kitchen table, as she laments, "I'm getting slower." The routine is efficient, even graceful, yet dehumanizing. Not only does this establish her socioeconomic status and long-suffering character, it indicates the same type of repetitive work which drove (the never-seen) Mr. Kusters to murder and suicide. Throughout the film, Fassbinder also uses color in fascinating ways, contrasting the unfulfilled lives of the Kusters with bright primaries - blues, yellows, and especially reds. This is simultaneously satirical, poignant, and even beautiful. He also makes achieves visual coherence and thematic resonance through the use of shape. In contrast to the often comic tone, the dominant visual motif is oppressive, of narrow openings (in doorways, halls, corridors) between stark walls, often shot from twisted angles and in shadow.

Although I don't want to give away either of the surprising endings, I believe both are effective. Each gives characters and themes closure, albeit in dramatically - or comically - different ways, even as they bring to mind Mother Kuster's bittersweet key line: "As my [husband] used to say, you have to see the good in all people." Fassbinder understands that simple, but difficult, maxim too, as he explores the emotional complexity of characters and their lives, in a film without any villains, but with one extraordinary woman at its heart.

As in all Fassbinder films, the regular actresses steal the show. Ingrid Caven is lovely as the aloof nightclub singer. Irm Hermann isn't quite as strong as she is in `Bitter Tears of P.V.K.' or `Merchant of Four Seasons,' but she makes an impression all the same. Margit Cartensen and Karl Heinz Bohm are very picturesque as the "armchair Communist" couple - all ideals but probably not willing to make any real sacrifices.

Probably Fassbinder's most political film, and a very important piece of his oeuvre.