The Bridegroom, the Comedienne and the Pimp(Der Bräutigam, die Komödiantin und der Zuhälter)

As students and workers arose to fight for social injustice in 1968, Straub-Huillet produced what they then claimed to be their ‘most political’ work. Combining a tracking shot of a Munich backstreet at nighttime, a staged performance of a Fassbinderstarring play about a man’s manipulation of his lovers, and finally one of those characters ‘breaking’ into real life as he tries (and fails) to wreck a happy, Jesuit-endorsed marriage, this playful work deconstructs love as a commodity that could be traded in the ‘free market’. While Huillet admitted the film as showing the oppression of women, it’s worth noting how it ends with a woman firing a literal last shot: ‘Women liberate themselves much more easily and quickly… when there is a total revolution.’ Screening with Sicilia!.