Irm HermannFilmography

Fashion Victims

Actors: Edgar Selge, Florian Bartholomai, Roman Knizka, Franziska Walser, Traute Hoess

Synopsis: A man who's all but impossible to like discovers this might be a drawback to his career in sales in this comedy from Germany. Wolfgang Zenker (Edgar Selge) is a salesman who makes his living peddling dowdy clothes for overweight and elderly women. Wolfgang has managed to enjoy a successful career Read More

Trust. Welfare

Actors: Florian Panzner, Inga Birkenfeld, Irm Hermann, Manfred Andrae, Joachim Paul Assböck

The Man From the Embassy

Synopsis: A lonely man opens his heart to a troubled child with unfortunate results in this drama. Herbert (Burghart Klaussner) is a low-level German bureaucrat who works at the nation's embassy in Tbilisi, a city in the Republic of Georgia. Herbert is a loner with few friends, and the only local person he Read More

My Brother is a Dog

Ten Minutes Older: The Cello

Actors: Amit Arroz, Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi, Mark Long, Alexandra Staden, Dominic West

Synopsis: Eight master directors of world cinema combine forces for this omnibus film that focuses cumulatively on the subject of time. Bookended by cello interludes, Ten Minutes Older: The Cello presents just one parameter to each of its filmmakers: no final entry can be more or less than ten minutes long. Read More

Fur Mich Gab Es Nur Noch Fassbinder - Die Glucklichen Opfer Des Rainer Werner F

Actors: Irm Hermann, Peer Raben, Hanna Schygulla

Synopsis: A made-on-HD video documentary about fascinating European filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder, directed by the equally notable Rosa von Prauheim, this feature attempts to shed light on his rocky life in a tell-all fashion. The film interviews several artists who worked with Fassbinder, dating back Read More

Paradiso - sieben Tage mit sieben Frauen

Actors: Hanns Zischler, Cora Frost, Adriana Altaras

Synopsis: What would happen if you gathered all the lovers you have had in your life in a single room and let them interact for a week? For his 60th birthday, a self-absorbed composer, Adam (Hanns Zischler), does just that: he assembles seven of the most influential women from his life and invites them to Read More

Tigerstreifenbaby Wartet Auf Tarzan

Actors: Herbert Fritsch, Cora Frost, Valeska Hanel, Irm Hermann, Rüdiger Vogler

Synopsis: Rudolf Thome directed this German science fiction drama that's slightly reminiscent of Nicolas Roeg's The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976). Driving to Berlin, Luise (Cora Frost) and Theo (Tilo Werner) give a lift to the enigmatic blond Frank Mackay (Herbert Fritsch), and Luise is immediately attracted Read More

Hades

Synopsis: This German political drama from iconoclastic filmmaker Herbert Achternbusch takes a slightly askew look at neo-Nazis and the Holocaust. His non-story (a typical trait of Achternbusch films) is divided into three parts. The first introduces Hades, an eccentric half-Jewish coffin maker. Also Read More

Victory

Actors: Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill, Simon Callow, Jean Yanne, Ho Yi

Synopsis: This third feature film version of Joseph Conrad's tragic romantic drama (the best of which remains John Cromwell's 1940 adaptation) is the one that stick's closest to the original story of a reclusive, hard-hearted fellow living on a private island in the Dutch East Indies who must protect his Read More

Pappa Ante Portas

Johanna d'Arc of Mongolia

Actors: Delphine Seyrig, Irm Hermann, Ines Sastre

Synopsis: While traveling on the Trans-Mongolian Railway, when a cozy group of female western tourists are abducted by a horde of female Mongolians wearing tribal dress, they fear the worst. They are forced to learn traditional Mongolian ways, and are made to do all sorts of onerous chores in the Read More

Z.B. Otto Spalt

Actors: Otto Sander, Katharina Thalbach, Udo Samel, Rolf Zacher, Helmut Krauss

Synopsis: Otto Sander plays a German film director who shows his films to a skeptical panel of censors in this satire. He unspools the reels of his work in front of officials and religious leaders who make up the censorship board. Many filmmakers' and celebrities' faces familiar to German audiences appear Read More

Seven Women, Seven Sins

Actors: Evelyne Didi, Gabriela Herz, Delphine Seyrig, Roberta Wallach

Synopsis: In this feature-length anthology of short films, seven women filmmakers from around the world interpret the seven "deadly sins" for a modern age. New Yorkers Bette Gordon and Maxi Cohen direct "Greed" and "Anger," respectively; Germans Helke Sander and Ulrike Ottinger take on "Gluttony" and Read More

Marie Ward

Actors: Hannelore Elsner, Irm Hermann, Lambert Hamel, Mathieu Carrière

Synopsis: The life and times of Marie Ward, the founder of the Loretto Order of nuns, (aka the Institute of Mary) are examined in this religious biography that is filmed on locations related to her activities. The unusually devout and independent nun originally came from a Catholic family in Yorkshire and Read More

Dorian Gray Im Spiegel Der Boulevardpresse

Actors: Delphine Seyrig, Irm Hermann

Synopsis: In another avant-garde, underground film, director Ulrike Ottinger takes up the decadent, self-indulgent character of Dorian Gray (Veruschka von Lehndorff) and uses him/her to explore the seamier side of Berlin night and street life -- for 2 1/2 hours of running time. About half that time would Read More

Die Schaukel

Actors: Joachim Bernhard, Lena Stolze, Christine Kaufmann

Synopsis: In this period film about the life of an aristocratic family in Munich just before World War I and the end of the aristocracy as such, there are a series of garden parties for the royalty and nobility, Christmas celebrations, an appearance by Eleanora Duse at the local theater, music recitals, and Read More

Ediths Tagebuch

Actors: Angela Winkler, Vadim Glowna

Synopsis: Edith runs a left-wing journal and when her marriage starts to fall apart (her husband is unfaithful), she can find no solace in her son who is more of a problem than an asset. On top of heading toward a divorce and being unable to handle her son's asocial tendencies, her neurotic uncle moves in Read More

Fünf letzte Tage

Actors: Irm Hermann, Lena Stolze, Will Spindler, Hans Hirschmuller

Synopsis: Sophie Scholl (Lena Stolze) and her brother were executed by the Nazis in World War II because they were members of a student anti-Nazi organization called the "White Rose." (Lena Stolze reprises her role as Scholl in the 1982 release of Die Weisse Rose.) Writer and director Percy Adlon focuses on Scholl Read More

Eisenhans

Actors: Gerhard Olschewski, Susanne Lothar, Hannelore Hoger, Michael Habeck, Hans Michael Rehberg

Synopsis: In this drama with an undercurrent of incest, a truck driver spends so much time with his mentally impaired younger daughter that neighbors' protests bring in a social worker who manages to get the young woman placed with a distant pastor's family before tragedy can strike. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Read More

Wo Geht's Denn Hier Zum Film?

Actors: Peter Kern, Kurt Raab, Dolly Dollar, Benno Hoffmann

Synopsis: Two bit players in the movies share a home together, spend their days getting as much work as they can, and keep scrapbooks of their minor triumphs - literally in the background of the cinematic world. Costumed in character as an executive, one of the players is riding the bus to work when a woman Read More

Lili Marleen

Actors: Hanna Schygulla, Giancarlo Giannini, Mel Ferrer, Karl-Heinz von Hassel, Christine Kaufmann

Synopsis: German cabaret star Lili Marleen inspired a song that was extremely popular with the German soldiers during WW II. This war drama offers a fictionalized account of her story that begins in 1938 while she performs in a Zurich cabaret. It is her boyfriend, a Swiss Jew who also turns out to be a Read More

Droemme stoejer ikke, narr de doer

Actors: Asta Esper Andersen, Jon Bang Carlsen, Irm Hermann

Synopsis: In rural Denmark, the less-than-loving family of an old farmer are gathered to await the ailing man's death. The son of the family is a left-wing politician who is embarrassed by his father's having collaborated a little with the Germans during World War II. He is also the sort of person who, when Read More

Woyzeck

Actors: Klaus Kinski, Eva Mattes, Wolfgang Reichmann, Willy Semmelrogge, Josef Bierbichler

Synopsis: Controversial German director Werner Herzog helmed this cinematization of Woyzeck, playwright Georg Büchner's anti-military tale of depersonalization run amok. Utilizing the more grotesque elements of German expressionism, combined with his own sense of the outrageous, Herzog plunges us directly Read More

Fear of Fear

Actors: Margit Carstensen, Ulrich Faulhaber, Brigitte Mira, Irm Hermann, Armin Meier

Synopsis: A housewife's slow descent into suicidal depression is chronicled in great detail in this movie by experimental film director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide Read More

Sternsteinhof

Actors: Katja Rupé, Tilo Prückner, Peter Kern, Agnes Fink, Elfriede Kuzmany

Synopsis: The lovely Leni (Katja Rupe) lives in a cottage on the slopes of the hill owned by the wealthy Sternstein farming family. She has had her eye on Toni, the son of that family, for some time and hopes to wed him and occupy the glorious Sternstein manor. Toni, too, has been longing to marry her. Read More

Fox and His Friends

Actors: Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Peter Chatel, Harry Baer, Adrian Hoven

Synopsis: Faustrecht der Freiheit (Fox and His Friends) was one of the many films in the short, but prolific, career of German auteur Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Fassbinder plays Franz Biberkopf, a financially poor gay man who performs in a traveling circus as Fox the Talking Head. One day, he lucks into Read More

Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven

Synopsis: Mother Kusters (Brigette Kira) is the wife of a factory worker who goes beserk one day, killing himself and the boss' son. Mother finds herself a media celebrity, which only serves to make herself and her late husband look like idiots. Later, Mother is "adopted" by a Communist couple who wish to Read More

Ali: Fear Eats the Soul

Actors: Brigitte Mira, El Hedi Ben Salem, Barbara Valentin, Irm Hermann, Peter Gauhe

Synopsis: Rainer Werner Fassbinder not only directed Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (Angst essen Seele auf), but also scripted the film, designed the sets, and produced. Brigitte Mira heads the cast as a lonely German cleaning woman, who enters into an affair with equally lonely--and much, much younger--Moroccan Read More

Effi Briest

Synopsis: Rainer Werner Fassbinder's adaptation of a late 19th-century novel by Theodor Fontane is an austere period piece that may be the least characteristic of the German director's films. The titular heroine, played by Fassbinder regular Hanna Schygulla, is a 17-year-old girl forced into a loveless Read More

The Tenderness of the Wolves

Actors: Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Kurt Raab

Synopsis: This dark horror film from director Ulli Lommel was based on the real-life crimes of Fritz Haarman (Kurt Raab), the so-called "Vampire of Dusseldorf" who murdered over 25 young boys, drank their blood, and sold their flesh as black-market meat. Several German films had depicted Haarman's murderous Read More

The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant

Actors: Margit Carstensen, Hanna Schygulla

Synopsis: This tale of intermingled love and hate is directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder, and is the 13th of the 33 films he made in his short life. It explores the universal dynamics present in close human relationships, even lesbian ones. Petra Von Kant (Margit Carstensen) is a fashion designer. Some Read More

Wildwechsel

Crew: First Assistant Director

Synopsis: Based on Franz Xaver Kroetz's play, which is in turn based on a true story, this film by Rainer Werner Fassbinder tells the story of a very young girl who, after persuading a local boy to become her lover, induces the lad to kill her father, whose incestuous sexual attentions to her have grown Read More

Pioneers in Ingolstadt

Actors: Irm Hermann, Hanna Schygulla

Synopsis: German filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder directs the made-for-TV melodrama Pioneers in Ingolstadt, based on the play by Marieluise Fleisser. The film opens as a parade of soldiers are marching through a town square singing patriotic songs. Alma (Irm Hermann) and Berta (Hanna Schygulla) are Read More

The Merchant of Four Seasons

Actors: Hans Hirschmuller, Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Synopsis: Der Händler der vier Jahreszeiten (The Merchant of Four Seasons) is about the deterioration of a man's soul. Fruit vendor Hans (Hans Hirschmüller) cannot please his family. His mother harps on his failures. His wife is openly discontent. He must peddle produce to his beloved ex-girlfriend, and he Read More

Pioniere in Ingolstadt

Why Does Herr R. Run Amok?

Actors: Kurt Raab, Lilith Ungerer, Amadeus Fengler

Synopsis: A technical designer enjoys a comfortable life with his wife and child. He has the approval of his boss and is in good health except for smoking too much according to his doctor. His wife is visited by a girlfriend one Sunday afternoon. The man is bored watching television and grabs a chandelier Read More

The American Soldier

Actors: Karl Scheydt, Elga Sorbas, Jan George, Hark Bohm, Ingrid Caven

Synopsis: American Soldier (originally Der Amerikanische Soldat) was the third of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's "gangster trilogy." The film stars Karl Scheid as a German/American Vietnam veteran who takes a job as a hired assassin on behalf of the Munich crime lords. Scheid works both sides of the fence when Read More

Love Is Colder Than Death

Actors: Ulli Lommel, Hanna Schygulla, Katrin Schaake, Ingrid Caven

Synopsis: An independent criminal's work is admired by organized crime. He is tortured after he refuses the invitation to join the gang but later relents and becomes a member. He continues to be a pimp and a murderer in this disturbing film that appeared at the Berlin Film Festival in 1969. This feature Read More

Gods of the Plague

Actors: Hanna Schygulla, Margarethe von Trotta, Harry Baer

Synopsis: Gods of the Plague (Gotter der Pest) is one of several German films directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder under his pseudonym of Franz Walsch. That's Fassbinder, however, playing the small role of a buyer of pornography. The main story involves a pair of two-bit hoods who spend most of the film Read More

Katzelmacher

Actors: Hanna Schygulla, Rudolf Waldemar Brem, Elga Sorbas

Synopsis: Jorgos (Rainer Werner Fassbinder) is a Greek immigrant in Germany who encounters the intolerance of the locals against foreign workers. Open hostility turns to violence when he is beaten up by the authoritarian thugs after dating a German woman. Male and female nudity along with hetero and Read More