Rainer Werner Fassbinder holds a unique place in cinema for his vast and idiosyncratic body of work. As Arrow Films release four key Fassbinder titles on DVD, with more promised, Tony Keily casts an eye over the excesses and successes of the writer/actor/director.

There's an anecdote about Rainer Werner Fassbinder that I rehash (probably inaccurately) on the basis of a longago reading of Ronald Hayman's 1984 biography. RWF was cruising Paris bathhouses for same-sex company in the early '70s when he met El Hedi ben Salem, a North African Migrant worker. He fell in love and brought the man back to Germany where he began to appear in RWF productions, starring in Fear Eats the Soul (1974). RWF insisted his lover abandon wife and family at home and set up [a] house with the director. But this was not enough. Deciding he wanted a family of his own, RWF demanded that El Hedi fetch one of his sons to live as their adopted child. Predictably, domestic bliss didn't please the impatient and unruly German, who soon tired of the child's moods and whining. The 'son' spent a lot of his time locked out on the freezing balcony of their apartment. Eventually the boy was sent home. Like son, like father: RWF tired of El Hedi too, personally and artistically. The actor saw his dreams of a bright future collapse. Feeling betrayed he sank into depression, eventually stabbing a passer-by during a violent rampage. With the police of several countries on his heels, he took flight, and was finally captured in Nimes, France, where he hanged himself in his cell. RWF dedicated his last film work, the Genet-adaptation Querelle (1982) to El Hedi ben Salem.

On the edge
The story is typical of a man who lived recklessly, excessively and outside the bounds of bourgeois society. He produced over 30 films in the 13 years preceding his death (1969-1982), as well as plays and TV productions, including the magnificent 15 hour adaptation of Alfred Döblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz. In his impatience to get things done, RWF acted, edited, photographed, set decorated or did whatever it took to keep activity up to pace. He also consumed industrial quantities of alcohol, hash and cocaine on and off set, and had a frenetic bisexual love life. When his heart let him down at the age of 37, he had filmed, fucked, sniffed and drunk more than anybody could reasonably expect to do in an ordinary lifespan.

The full article is printed in Film Ireland 112.