Embrace the cuck. Accept it. Surface veneer (I know that’s redundant) of a 50’s Technicolor melodrama. Lola (1981, Rainer Werner Fassbinder) cuts too deep. So deep it angers me. Were I to judge it based on a film’s impact its ability to stay with you then this thing wins the award.
Jumping to the end. Do you find this narrative credible once VON BOHM (Armin Mueller-Stahl) marries LOLA (Sukowa)? That’s what I wrestle with. This old fashioned strictly by the book bureaucrat middle-aged romantic lured away by his own lust taking the biggest whore in town as his bride knowing full well that she’s owned and operated by his most detested employee. That’s his arc. Inevitable. The only way this narrative could end. That I hate it so much means it works so well. Like the pathetic schlub he is I also fell for it.
Because Sukowa is amazing. She makes it work. Her ebullient effervescence. Her raucous rowdy laughter and that squeak ever so often that’s an octave higher. I was so into this thing I missed the Fassbinder bubble coalescing right before my eyes. Lola wanting this respectable acceptable they say she can’t have. To legitimize her own reputation? No to conquer him for her own gain. When she dresses up as a bookworm. Their first date going to that church they have all to themselves singing hymns together. Her dalmatian dotted hoop dress. All the better to destroy you with.
She even warns him. Leave town. I’m corrupt. He’s a frumpy age gap with what to offer her though? Her playing him I get. But marrying her? And Schuckert’s wedding present a trustfund whorehouse left to his illegitimate daughter Lola is to rear with von Bohm is further than I’ve seen Fassbinder or anyone else satirize the legacy of tradwife as secret prostie. The twist is von Bohm doesn’t wind up a geek in a catatonic stupor. He seems content. And that’s what’s truly chilling. I’ll save the final ending for you to experience yourself.
Being deceived is one thing. That’s a cuckold. But to know what you’re walking into is the stuff of tragedy. This is one of Fassbinder’s bleakest plots. One of the most transactional of all time. But that’s the point. Pussy is a line item of the town’s budget and integral to its infrastructure. Lola leverages it to her own advantage. And furthermore that of her daughter’s. Are they victim or survivor?
Anyway Xaver Schwarzenberger’s color cinematography here is what I’ve always considered the most colorful movie ever. Except in terms of primary hues and saturation it’s beat by Speed Racer (2008, Wachowskis). In Lola the brothel is sumptuously lit with gels that give it this robust palette of mostly pinks with reds oranges purples baby blue and occasionally a burst of lime. Have you ever noticed how many of the sources in this film are unmotivated? The real outrage is how come there’s never been more of it? Think Bob Richadson. Natural Born Killers (1994, Oliver Stone). That’s my cause. My protest. More unmotivated light sources. Yeah early morning at von Bohm’s office where does that blast of lime bursting in come from? Exactly. This film is a monument to gels. When von Bohm is brought to the brothel the first time and he’s hit with that baby blue cast and the reverse of Lola on stage in pink then switches her to matching blue and pushes in is expressionist code for us to feel. There’s not another movie I can think of that compares to Lola in terms of lighting.
Because Sukowa is amazing. She makes it work. Her ebullient effervescence. Her raucous rowdy laughter and that squeak ever so often that’s an octave higher. I was so into this thing I missed the Fassbinder bubble coalescing right before my eyes. Lola wanting this respectable acceptable they say she can’t have. To legitimize her own reputation? No to conquer him for her own gain. When she dresses up as a bookworm. Their first date going to that church they have all to themselves singing hymns together. Her dalmatian dotted hoop dress. All the better to destroy you with.
She even warns him. Leave town. I’m corrupt. He’s a frumpy age gap with what to offer her though? Her playing him I get. But marrying her? And Schuckert’s wedding present a trustfund whorehouse left to his illegitimate daughter Lola is to rear with von Bohm is further than I’ve seen Fassbinder or anyone else satirize the legacy of tradwife as secret prostie. The twist is von Bohm doesn’t wind up a geek in a catatonic stupor. He seems content. And that’s what’s truly chilling. I’ll save the final ending for you to experience yourself.
Being deceived is one thing. That’s a cuckold. But to know what you’re walking into is the stuff of tragedy. This is one of Fassbinder’s bleakest plots. One of the most transactional of all time. But that’s the point. Pussy is a line item of the town’s budget and integral to its infrastructure. Lola leverages it to her own advantage. And furthermore that of her daughter’s. Are they victim or survivor?
Anyway Xaver Schwarzenberger’s color cinematography here is what I’ve always considered the most colorful movie ever. Except in terms of primary hues and saturation it’s beat by Speed Racer (2008, Wachowskis). In Lola the brothel is sumptuously lit with gels that give it this robust palette of mostly pinks with reds oranges purples baby blue and occasionally a burst of lime. Have you ever noticed how many of the sources in this film are unmotivated? The real outrage is how come there’s never been more of it? Think Bob Richadson. Natural Born Killers (1994, Oliver Stone). That’s my cause. My protest. More unmotivated light sources. Yeah early morning at von Bohm’s office where does that blast of lime bursting in come from? Exactly. This film is a monument to gels. When von Bohm is brought to the brothel the first time and he’s hit with that baby blue cast and the reverse of Lola on stage in pink then switches her to matching blue and pushes in is expressionist code for us to feel. There’s not another movie I can think of that compares to Lola in terms of lighting.
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