Between the graphic, transgressive shock horror of Nekromantiks 1 and 2, director Jörg Buttgereit gave fans of extreme underground cinema this experimental arthouse/exploitation study of the act of suicide, depicting seven examples of self-destruction over the course of one week. As a bonus, in between the suicides we get to see the body of a dead man decompose via time lapse photography. Cheery stuff then.
First to take his own life is a man (Hermann Kopp) obsessed with fish. He studies fish, has a fish poster on his wall, eats fish, keeps a pet goldfish, and has a little picture of a fish on his mailbox. Rather fittingly, he dies in a full bath-tub after taking an overdose washed down with wine. The standout scene is a prolonged rotating shot of his apartment, showing the passage of time, just the start of Jörg getting creative with his visuals.
Day two sees a guy (Heinrich Ebber) renting a Nazisploitation film (called Vera, Gestapo's Angel of Death) from his local video shop. He sits down and watches the movie, which contains the sickening sight of a man having his penis cut off with a pair of garden shears. His girlfriend arrives and interrupts his viewing, so he shoots her in the head and frames the resulting splatter on the wall. All of this turns out to be a film within Buttgereit's film, which makes the Nazisploitation movie a film within a film within a film.
On day three, a rainy Wednesday, a man on a park bench (Michael Krause) recounts to a pretty woman (Susanne Betz) how his relationship with his wife became strained when she got ill, after which he puts a gun in his mouth and decorates a park statue with his brain.
Thursday is simple in concept, yet extremely moving: artful shots of a bridge, with captions naming all of the people who have thrown themselves off the edge. Buttgereit's impressive photography of the bridge combined with the long list of names make this compelling yet depressing stuff.
Friday follows a lonely spinster who enviously spies on two seemingly happy lovers in a neighbouring apartment. The woman receives a suicide chain letter that says she must make copies of the letter and then take her own life, but she decides to eat chocolates instead. The camera then shifts to the other apartment where the lovers are in bed together, covered in blood, having killed themselves.
The next segment concerns a young woman (Angelika Hoch) who commits 'amok suicide' by embarking a rampage shooting spree. Using a harness to mount a camera to her torso, the woman films the killings, which allows Buttgereit to show the action in first person shooter style, anticipating films like Doom and Hardcore Henry.
Last up is an extremely harrowing story of a tormented individual whose extreme anguish drives him to death. Buttgereit doesn't let on precisely what his character's personal demons are, but watching the poor fellow writhe and scream in agony (mental or physical?) is uncomfortable viewing, particularly when he begins to bash his head against a wall out of sheer desperation.
A bold experiment in film-making, exploring an uncomfortable subject in a visually and aurally interesting manner, Der Todesking is not for everyone, but then what art is?
7.5/10, rounded up to 8 for IMDb. For those looking for more low-budget, German, suicide-themed cinema, try Suicide (2001), which was surely inspired by Buttgereit's film.
