Fascism and sexuality in film and pop culture. Lecture by Marcus Stiglegger + Salon Kitty (IT 1976, Tinto Brass)
GEGENkino is drawing near. We can’t even fall asleep anymore out of excitement (and last-minute organizational stuff). If you are also insomniac why not spend your nights with reading knowledgeable, lengthy essays on obscure film makers and genres? You can find them over there on Marcus Stiglegger’s blog. He will come to GEGENkino on the last day of the festival and give a lecture about “Fascism and sexuality in movies and popular culture”, followed by a screening of Tinto Brass’ “Salon Kitty”.
13 April, 8pm, UT Connewitz – Lecture and film: 8/6 (red.)
Fascism and sexuality in film and pop culture. Lecture by Marcus Stiglegger (in German)
Depicting fascist regimes in film, prostitution and perversion, dominance and sexual dependence belong to the core inventory of motives adducted aiming at sensationally sexualizing and maximally gratifying the topic. Starting out from this condensation of sexuality, cruelty and politics, film scholar Marcus Stiglegger will build on mainstream cinema and cinema d’auteur. He will start with the 1970ies and their extremely ambitious productions, politically and philosophically inspired by their day, for instance Pasolini’s “Salò – the 120 Days of Sodom” or Visconti’s “The Damned”. Then he will point out the difference between them and several exploitative followers, who converted the alleged formula of success of the prominent predecessors into a softcore context.
Based on film samples, Stiglegger leads to essential representatives of exploitative and untrivial cinema by asking about function and response of sometimes subtle, sometimes pithy examples quoting fascist symbolism in pop culture. How are iconic traditions and fetish of fascism employed in the rock’n’roll airs of Marilyn Manson and the critical overaffirmation of the band Laibach?
Following the lecture: Salon Kitty (IT 1976, D: Tinto Brass, A: Helmut Berger, Ingrid Thuling, Teresa Ann Savoy, 102’, German Version, 35mm)
SS-officer Wallenberg turns the noble brothel “Salon Kitty” into an establishment of wiretapping. There, willing and party-loyal women draw secrets from foreign diplomats and exalted Nazi-officials. Desertian plans get public, an execution ensues. Margharete, a prostitute, and Kitty, the whoremistress, want to regain justice and begin to sabotage Wallenberg. In addition to the excellent directing of Tinto Brass, the film impresses with the set design by Ken Adams, who already worked on Kubrick’s “Barry Lyndon”.
