Review of Bremen Freedom

After an image of a Jesus sculpture with outstretched arms sets the tone for the "bourgeois tragedy" which follows, we see cuts to a woman's feet in boots, rushing to the orders of a man, his face framed prominently at the edge of the screen, who bosses her around, as a baby cries in the background. At first we assume this is a servant, then we learn it his his wife, and from the paper that he reads that it is 1814. As other men come to visit, the poor woman gets down on her knees in a submissive position. All of this is presented with a contrast between numerous closeups, longer shots where the bottom half of the image is an empty white stage,and occasional zooms, with stylized projected film backdrops, in various tints, often of waves and boats (Though incongruously the town in which the story occurs, Bremen, is not a seaport!)This is a 1971 play written for Margit Carstensen, arguably the greatest of all the talented actresses who worked with Fassbinder. The source was a case from the local court archives of a woman who was executed after committing 15 murders, and a similar play,Maria Magdalena, by Hebbel. Fassbinder put the drama on in the city of Bremen itself. It is also known in English as Bremen Coffee,since one of the recurring motifs on the minimally furnished stage is a coffee and tea cabinet to which Carstensen keeps coming, with that inimitable wry look, offering various family and guests a drink before each of them meets their doom.One of them is her mother, played by Lilo Pempeit, Fassbinder's mother. After that obit is announced, Carstensen describes her as having been a "Haustier" (domestic animal.)As this murderess increasingly becomes more confident, the men that keep entering to try to help remind her that women are not supposed to think or try to run a business (as she has learned to) by herself. The last of these is her brother, who returns on crutches from a war, his face still bloodied, and then her sister (played by a young Hanna Schygulla) who doesn't want to be like her, so is poisoned in turn. The "Freiheit" or freedom of the title that Carstensen's character achieves is to get rid of all those who would thwart her. If feminism is a brew, then this is indeed a very dark and bitter cup!