ruediger_vienna

A guy having sex with a woman on a rooftop - just to get her coffee-machine. The opening sequence of Exit - "Don't Panic" tells it all: Hanno Pöschl (his best movie appearance ever) stars as a young outskirt mug; stealing cars he just has one dream: his own coffee house. But tumbling through the Viennese underground, he is keeping himself busy with trouble...

This is quite the movie parents in 1980's Austria did not want their kids to see. Violence, some nudity and very explicit language - which make the movie more than fairly entertaining.

Add a very young Paulus Manker and you get -9 points out of ten.

This movie is now (2007) available on DVD - get it!

Schamlos (shameless) is an exceptional Austrian movie by an exceptional director. While Austrian movies in the 60s mainly were Heimatfilme - colorful pictures about the better days back in the monarchy - Saller did not care too much about this mainstream and started with b/w exploitation cinema. His first movie - "Geißel des Fleisches" - came as a shock to Austrians, his second movie "Schamlos" repeated that experience.

A very dynamic Udo Kier stars as Pohlmann, a teenager setting up a gang to collect protection money, who falls in love with an exotic dancer, who gets murdered. Can Pohlmann revenge her? Pohlmann investigates in caravans, used as mobile whorehouses, threatens everybody he meets with violence - all in all, he behaves like bad guys should behave - especially if you take the German TV series "Der Komissar" as a pattern (which started 2 years later).

The score unbelievable - especially the main theme played during the scenes in the "beatschuppen" (mixture between speakeasy and disco).

All in all a really entertaining movie - and don't forget: you can always tell people that you just watch it for historical research...

"Schamlos" is now released on DVD in an edition by Austrian newspaper "Der Standard" for the first time ever - audio is only available in German.

7 out of 10