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Movies / On DVD / Martha
Martha

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Martha (1973)

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83 %
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Reviews Counted:6

Fresh:5

Rotten:1

Average Rating:7.7/10

Rated: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hr 55 mins

Genre: Foreign Films

Synopsis: Rainer Werner Fassbinder's MARTHA presents a case study in abuse, terror, and victimhood in the form of its main character, the aging spinster Martha (Margit Carstensen). Suffering a constant... Rainer Werner Fassbinder's MARTHA presents a case study in abuse, terror, and victimhood in the form of its main character, the aging spinster Martha (Margit Carstensen). Suffering a constant stream of verbal abuse and domination of her life by both by her father and mother, Martha feels little remorse when her father dies suddenly while on vacation in Rome. Upon her return home, Martha chooses to escape from her mother by marrying Helmuth (Karlheinz Bohm). She soon finds, however, that Helmuth provides not rescue, but a further descent into terror. [More]

Starring: Margit Carstensen, Karlheinz Böhm, Barbara Valentin, Peter Chatel

Starring: Margit Carstensen, Karlheinz Böhm, Barbara Valentin, Peter Chatel, Gisela Fackeldey, Adrian Hoven

Director: Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Director: Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Story: Cornell Woolrich

[See More Credits]

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Release:

Feb 24, 2004

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Reviews for Martha

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1 - 8 (sorted by date)
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Acerbic black satire of a bourgeois marriage.

Full Review Source: Ozus' World Movie Reviews | comment Comment
05/23/06
Dennis Schwartz
Dennis Schwartz
Ozus' World Movie Reviews
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Time Out | comment Comment
02/09/06
Derek Adams
Derek Adams
Time Out

You don't have to agree with its premise -- that middle-class marriage equals sadomasochism -- to respond to the bravura comic glee with which the director lays it out.

Full Review Source: New York Times | comment Comment
01/15/05
Stephen Holden
Stephen Holden
New York Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Fassbinder offers up an extremely bleak work here, even for him, but ultimately the film works mainly as the diatribe against marriage that it is.

Full Review Source: Filmcritic.com | comment Comment
12/09/04
Christopher Null
Christopher Null
Filmcritic.com

The ornate sets and colorful camerawork only belie the disturbed nature of this truly sick film.

Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid | comment Comment
06/14/04
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Jeffrey M. Anderson
Combustible Celluloid
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Film4 | comment Comment
09/03/03
Film4

A horrific black comedy -- a devastating view of bourgeois marriage rendered in a delirious baroque style.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
09/03/03
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Chicago Reader
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Easily the most twisted film of Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s career, Martha (a favorite of his frequent cinematographer Michael Ballhaus) catalogs the tyrannical hold a bourgeois husband has over his wife.

Full Review Source: Slant Magazine | comment Comment
09/02/03
Ed Gonzalez
Ed Gonzalez
Slant Magazine
 
 
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