Num Ano de 13 Luas

As some others have written or implied this film is absolutely exhausting. It doesn't abandon its character or his life at any time although at times we almost WANT relief. Mahler's music in films has been dutifully noted. It can be almost as depressing in concert version. As for Nino Rota's "happy" music, or "life just continues (joyfully)" score, the irony isn't lost either. This is a one-man job and therefore takes risks that few producers or companies would tolerate under normal circumstances. I was profoundly moved by the film; I just don't plan to see it again for a while.

Curtis Stotlar

Fassbinder's genius is making you feel as trapped and desperate as Elvira, you really feel empathy for the character. Only the visit with her family is there a brief respite from her pain. Kudos for Fassbinder for his good taste in using Suicide's "Frankie Teardrop" on the soundtrack--a song about a man who feels trapped, but directs his anger outward, rather than inward, like Elvira.

I have to save my comments for later...I began watching this film last night and, as disturbing as the slaughterhouse scene actually is, I was only able to make it halfway through. I will return. It amazes me when a film disturbs me so much that I cannot watch it in one sitting. I had similar reactions to both Pasolini's "Salo" and to Cronenberg's "Crash".

But I'm curious to learn from anyone who might have a clue why Nino Rota's theme music from "Amarcord" (original orchestration) was put in this movie's first half and yet isn't credited on IMDb's list of "combined details".

Anybody who might offer some insight on this omission....thanks for posting it here....

I watched this movie and after my first reaction wasn't that clear. sometimes boring perhaps? but then i was thinking about it, more and more and it touched me more and more and in a strange way i compared this one with the all time classic x-mas movie IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE from Capra. in the mood way. Interesting to say, that also in 13 MOONS there is an angel like in the x-mas Movie. It's the character ROTE ZORA. While Capra's angel had success, it's will know, it will not happen in 13 Moons.

of course while you will learn by the Frank Capra movie how important each human being is in the world we live in, Fassbinder gives you here the lesson how hopeless life can be. So while you have tears in your eyes by watching IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE, you see all the hope in this movie and you know there will be a happy end. From the first second on in this movie you know, there will be no happy end. And you will have no tears in your eyes at the end, but perhaps you will be a little bit speechless. From Hollywood a movie like this never will come. This movie don't want to entertain you in a Hollywood way. so be prepared!

This movie is the most personal Fasssbinder for sure. He lost some weeks before his boyfriend. then he wrote in three days the whole script. Unbelievable to tell that he ALSO was responsible for BOOK/EDITING/CAMERA (Michael Ballhaus was asked for, but he couldn't)/PRODUCING/IDEA/EQUIPMENT and of course DIRECTING it. The Music score is very good (classic meets suicide (the new wave band) meets sixties rock'n roll meets Connie Francis). A terrific Volker Spengler as the main character as also a stunning Ingrid Caven.

Almost impossible to understand the whole plot when you have to read the English subtitles, it's absolutely recommend when you can speak German.

Beginning with the written introduction about the 13 Moons, through the slaughterhouse scene (which is remarkable for the whole movie, because here he shows us the Life and the Death, the hopeless the movie is about in a short sequence), through the next scene where elvira is lying very depressed on the bed while the record player plays a x-mas song (it's a wonderful life......), but the song has a scratch (hopeless again) to the important scene where elvira tries to become erwin again (but failed), the two hours of this movie is very sensitive. It's not a movie to watch between Forrest Gump and Star Wars (...). It's a movie which brings you back to the ground of earth. So honest that you feel pain.

Everyone will have a time in life in which he falls in a hole. This movie is showing that. A tragedy. OR a horror trip.

Fassbinder have have drilled the nail into the coffin of art film, forever establishing it as a genre in which only 1 person out of a thousand will actually like, enjoy, or want to study. One of those people happened to be my narrative avant-garde film proffessor. while this story of a man who switched genders...."just because" is deatheningly depressing and bloatedly long, there are redeeming qualities. This is appears to be a crystal clear message of struggle and love letter to the suffering of existence by Rainer Fassbinder, a homosexual who lived a short life and probably wrote this about an ex-boyfriend of his who committed suicide in his apartment.

The greatest moments in this film come when the storyline completely veers off center about 2/3 of the way through the film when we confront the bill gates-esque anton saitz, who has been a mythically obtuse figure up until this point. the director's wonderful gift for presenting the postmodern shows up first when elvira meets a man who mysteriously knows everything about anton s"ai"tz. "that's anton with a-i. that's the important thing" Next, we are treated to some wonderful dialogue between a suicidal janitor and Elvira which can only be described as highly surreal. Elvira reports the janitor's behavior to a hard-of-hearing secretary-like woman who may easily have been referenced in Being John Malkovich, who shrugs it off to look through a mysterious keyhole.

Apart from this, Fassbinder's film is heavy on human emotion, which is curious taken Fassbinder's philosophy that emotions are lies. surely, Elvira is not a character that the film itself is sympathetic with (this is not melodrama or 'boys don't cry'-like message sending), but one can sense the pain and confusion within her undoingdespite her being such a pathetic creature. so much so that it's difficult to even watch.

my love for the mid-section of big business is also unfortunately my source of dismay at this movie. it's violently uneven. and i have a hard time with film directors who can get away with this 'avant-garde' crap by taking simply playing around with the medium, wherein with any other form (literature, poetry, television, music) that jumping around would just seem like you didn't know what you're doing.

In the Year of 13 Moons is a wonderful movie for study, but it's not for enjoyment or amusement- as with so many films that have followed it.