Mother s Mask ( Mutters Maske), Christoph Schlingensief, 1988

Mothers Mask is a free adaptation of the film Opfergang (1944) aka The Great Sacrifice of Veit Harlan. Schlingensief exposes his source materials dangerous proximity to kitsch and camp by reducing the genre conventions known from Harlan, Sirk, Fassbinder Co to the level of a daily soap: set within a noble family from the German Ruhr, Schlingensiefs story revolving about Willy von Mühlenbecks tragic love to terminally ill neighbor girl Äls (Susanne Bredehöft) and the inheritance intrigues by his evil brother Martin von Mühlenbeck (Helge Schneider) creaks with melodramatic devices and selfconscious dialogues. Rather than being a mere spoof, Mothers Mask is perhaps Schlingensiefs purest black comedy.