This page uses content from the Rainer Werner Fassbinder biography page on the English version of Wikipedia and is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. This list of authors can be seen in the page history. Rotten Tomatoes disclaims any and all warranties as to the accuracy or reliability of the content.

Fassbinder redirects here. For other names related to Fassbinder, see Fass (onomastics).

Rainer Werner Fassbinder (May 31, 1945 – June 10, 1982) was a German movie director, screenwriter and actor, one of the most important representatives of the New German Cinema.

Biography

Rainer Werner Maria Fassbinder was born in the Bavarian town of Bad Wörishofen. In his short life he not only made 43 films (including two shorts and the 15 ½ hour Berlin Alexanderplatz), but he also worked as an actor (film and theatre), cameraman, composer, designer, editor, producer and theatre manager.

Fassbinder's prodigious cinematic output is legendary. He made, on average, a film every hundred days. His intense discipline and phenomenal creative energy when working were in violent contrast with the excesses of abasement and tortured relationships of his personal life with the people he drew around him in a surrogate family of actors (including Kurt Raab and Hanna Schygulla), technicians and cameramen (notably Michael Ballhaus) in a similar way to John Cassavetes.

Fassbinder was openly gay and a many of his films dealt with gay characters - keeping with his interest in characters that were deemed outsiders by society.

Fassbinder died of a drug overdose at the age of 37. There is debate as to whether this was a deliberate drug overdose. His death is often considered to mark the end of New German Cinema.

There is a biography in English, Fassbinder: The Life and Work of a Provocative Genius by Christian Braad Thomsen, translated by Martin Chalmers (ISBN 0-571-17842-1).

Major works

Documentaries about Fassbinder

Bibliographies

• Fassbinder Bibliography (via UC Berkeley)

External links

• http://www.fassbinderfoundation.de
• http://www.rafamorata.com/fassbinder.html
• Senses of Cinema: Great Directors Critical Database
• filmportal.de including biography, filmography, photos, texts
• Overview of Fassbinder's cinematic and theatre careers
• Holy Whore: Remembering Rainer Werner Fassbinder
• Interview with Hanna Schygulla about Fassbinder
• Short film clip with Fassbinder's editor Julianne Lorenz
• Rainer Fassbinder's Gravesite

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