O Bar Luva Dourada

Based on a true story. Keep that in mind when this movie sucks you down into the abyss of one of post war West-Germany's darkest rough places. It's a biopic, not a horror-movie. People say that this movie was all about shock value and grossly exaggerated, or a "wannabe Lars von Trier" flick ... but this is the movie Lars von Trier wishes he would have come up with. The settings are an exact 1:1 replica of the original sites. The bar "Der Goldene Handschuh" in Hamburg still exists to this day and frankly hasn't changed much since then. Fritz Honka's flat was carefully recreated, the storyline and characters pictured is authentic as close as it gets. This also means that it isn't very pleasant to the eye.

The story takes us to a journey to the alcoholic dark underclass scene of the 1970's in Hamburg's Reeperbahn, close the harbor, following one of Germanys most infamous serial killers, Fritz Honka speaking with a strong East-German dialect. Mind you, this is not a Hollywood picture and it's one of those movies that would never get an Academy Award even though cinematography, costumes, acting and set-design is beyond astonishing. It's just too real. More often than not the picture is layered behind a thick cigarette smoke layer inside nicotine yellowed walls. The soundtrack solely consists of contemporary German "Schlager"music, including Honka's favorite song "Es geht eine Träne auf Reisen" ("A tear goes on a journey") ... all those songs are just harmless contemporary witnesses but add so much to the dense atmosphere and convert them into the sickish part of the narration.

I'm a big fan of gritty movies but this movie showed me that I've seen nothing yet. Frankly I had to stop the movie about three times because it was just too HEAVY. It's graphic, it's gross, it's too much at times. And yet I consider it one of the best indie movies of the last decade. It is in lieu of Gaspar Noé's "Seul contre tous" (I stand alone) exept ... this really happened. As pictured.