Art film espionage thriller spoof. The Third Generation (1979, Rainer Werner Fassbinder) takes aim at a terrorist cell whose members are bourgeois pseudointellectuals with nothing better to do with their lives. It thoroughly builds a sociopolitical power dynamic causal web connecting how each of its ensemble are connected and affected by this stupid little game. Its tone is deadly serious. It’s mode of ridicule is calculated controlled sparse.
The consolidation of power rules the world. AUGUST (Volker Spengler) runs the terrorist group. PJ LURZ (Eddie Constantine) runs big business. At the highest level of secrecy is the conspiracy these two have schemed up. A sinister for profit mutually beneficial partnership. Their motive: terrorism as ploy to get the government to provide greater security measures for transnational conglomerates. Fun and games man. On the surface Fassbinder takes all of this very serious.
The first signs something’s off begin with some contempt for Jean-Luc Godard. So you know how there’s that line from Le petit soldat (1963, Godard) “cinema is truth twenty-four times per second?” In The Third Generation Lurz blathers that dialogue “Movies consist of twenty-five lies a second, and because everything is a lie, it’s also the truth. And the fact that the truth is also a lie that becomes clear with every movie you watch. But in movies, ideas mask the lies and suggest they are truth.” And the way in The Third Generation its Godard style chapter headings are all filthy depraved lewd or xenophobic bigotry quotes claiming to have been transcribed from scrawlings found in men’s rooms in public toilets suggests a beef. Or playful subversion. Your pick.
Additionally when HILDE (Bulle Ogier) teaches that political class and the student challenges her confronting her lesson plan on the 1848 revolution and her curriculum with his own interpretation as fomenting another Third Reich she shuts him down. Meaning the point of all this seems to be Fassbinder showing how what all of this posturing has in common is that it’s so convoluted as to be pointless. Yet its adherents take it all so very seriously. High stakes. Life or death. And not just their own but innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire as well.
That’s what the junkie means to me. No one cares about her but they all complain she’s jeopardizing their cover. Particularly telling is that line one of them says “she’ll probably leave soon anyway,” you know they really mean od. But because the one character who truly cares about her is Günther Kaufmann as FRANZ WALSCH (a very important name in a Fassbinder movie) there is a possibility that substance abuse severe drug problem is likened to terrorism albeit in contrast depicting what terrorism does to a large group drug dependency does to the individual. Hard drugs illegal narcotics increase spending in government and private sectors healthcare and law enforcement (increasing profits for those who stand to gain). Racketeering. Fun and games man. Her oding also is what deadens Franz to caring about his own life and enables him to be enlisted by the terrorist cell. The spread of disaffection death. Right? See? Okay now we’re in Fassbinder territory proper.
The white knuckle thriller tone of The Third Generation crescendos until the final act when it becomes a melodrama. Okay the other big tipoff as to how to interpret all this is the disguises the terrorist cell use. First there’s that bank robbery and Franz goes full on blackface. Then when they subsequently are forced into hiding they get increasingly ridiculous. August as a woman. That couple with the baby is gut punch riot hilarious. Especially because they play it deadpan against type. Like where did they get a baby? For a prop disguise to take into hiding? There’s no mention of where the baby even came from. Too much. I love it.
We know August is manipulating these misguided gullible marks yet the world they live in has its allure. Hipster crashpad. Like what is it they say about cults? The people who end up in them are those with no life empty looking for anything to believe in. A new direction for Fassbinder. Another stand-alone masterpiece in alienation disillusionment trajectory.
The first signs something’s off begin with some contempt for Jean-Luc Godard. So you know how there’s that line from Le petit soldat (1963, Godard) “cinema is truth twenty-four times per second?” In The Third Generation Lurz blathers that dialogue “Movies consist of twenty-five lies a second, and because everything is a lie, it’s also the truth. And the fact that the truth is also a lie that becomes clear with every movie you watch. But in movies, ideas mask the lies and suggest they are truth.” And the way in The Third Generation its Godard style chapter headings are all filthy depraved lewd or xenophobic bigotry quotes claiming to have been transcribed from scrawlings found in men’s rooms in public toilets suggests a beef. Or playful subversion. Your pick.
Additionally when HILDE (Bulle Ogier) teaches that political class and the student challenges her confronting her lesson plan on the 1848 revolution and her curriculum with his own interpretation as fomenting another Third Reich she shuts him down. Meaning the point of all this seems to be Fassbinder showing how what all of this posturing has in common is that it’s so convoluted as to be pointless. Yet its adherents take it all so very seriously. High stakes. Life or death. And not just their own but innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire as well.
That’s what the junkie means to me. No one cares about her but they all complain she’s jeopardizing their cover. Particularly telling is that line one of them says “she’ll probably leave soon anyway,” you know they really mean od. But because the one character who truly cares about her is Günther Kaufmann as FRANZ WALSCH (a very important name in a Fassbinder movie) there is a possibility that substance abuse severe drug problem is likened to terrorism albeit in contrast depicting what terrorism does to a large group drug dependency does to the individual. Hard drugs illegal narcotics increase spending in government and private sectors healthcare and law enforcement (increasing profits for those who stand to gain). Racketeering. Fun and games man. Her oding also is what deadens Franz to caring about his own life and enables him to be enlisted by the terrorist cell. The spread of disaffection death. Right? See? Okay now we’re in Fassbinder territory proper.
The white knuckle thriller tone of The Third Generation crescendos until the final act when it becomes a melodrama. Okay the other big tipoff as to how to interpret all this is the disguises the terrorist cell use. First there’s that bank robbery and Franz goes full on blackface. Then when they subsequently are forced into hiding they get increasingly ridiculous. August as a woman. That couple with the baby is gut punch riot hilarious. Especially because they play it deadpan against type. Like where did they get a baby? For a prop disguise to take into hiding? There’s no mention of where the baby even came from. Too much. I love it.
We know August is manipulating these misguided gullible marks yet the world they live in has its allure. Hipster crashpad. Like what is it they say about cults? The people who end up in them are those with no life empty looking for anything to believe in. A new direction for Fassbinder. Another stand-alone masterpiece in alienation disillusionment trajectory.
