Der GROSSE VERHAU

(vt The Big Mess) Film (1970). Kairos Film. Prod and dir Alexander Kluge, starring Siegfried Graue, Vincenz Starr, Maria Sterr, Silvia Forsthofer. Screenplay Kluge, Wolfgang Mai. 86 mins. B/w and Colour.

   This West German comedy is by a director - a leading light of the German New Wave - whose apprenticeship was with Fritz LANG. It is an amusing DYSTOPIA set in AD2034, when the Galaxy has been opened up to entrepreneurs, and monopolycapitalism - in this case the Suez Canal Company - is rampant. DGV focuses on two not especially bright astronauts caught in the muddle of the system, who smuggle, wreck spaceships for scrap or do deals with insurance companies. The imagery of working stiffs in ramshackle spacecraft points forward to ALIEN (1979).

   PN