Veronika Voss (1982)

A washed up UFA actress, kept by her doctor, raises suspicion in a sports journalist.

Director:

Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Writers:

Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Pea Fröhlich

Stars:

Rosel Zech, Hilmar Thate, Cornelia Froboess

4 wins & 4 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Rosel Zech	...	Veronika Voss
Hilmar Thate	...	Robert Krohn
Cornelia Froboess	...	Henriette
Annemarie Düringer	...	Dr. Marianne Katz
Doris Schade	...	Josefa
Erik Schumann	...	Dr. Edel
Peter Berling	...	Filmproduzent / Dicker Mann
Günther Kaufmann	...	G.I. / Dealer (as Günter Kaufmann)
Sonja Neudorfer	...	Verkäuferin
Lilo Pempeit	...	Chehm
Volker Spengler	...	1. Regisseur
Herbert Steinmetz	...	Gärtner
Elisabeth Volkmann	...	Grete
Hans Wyprächtiger	...	Chefredakteur
Peter Zadek	...	2. Regisseur

Storyline

Munich, 1955: A sports journalist meets Veronika Voss, an UFA actress who supposedly had an affair with Goebbels. Now declining, Voss is kept by her "kind" doctor, Dr. Katz, supplying her house, food, clean clothes and her favourite: morphine. Voss, trying to come back towards the cinema, cannot perform an absurdly simple scene, but it attracts the attention of the journalist, who suspects that something's very wrong regarding her doctor.

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Plot Keywords:

actress | psychic | insane woman | former star | part of trilogy | 

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Genres:

Drama

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

West Germany

Language:

German English

Release Date:

13 May 1982 (Netherlands)

Also Known As:

Veronika Voss

Filming Locations:

Bavaria Studios, Bavariafilmplatz 7, Geiselgasteig, Grünwald, Bavaria, Germany

Box Office

Budget:

DEM 2,600,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Laura Film, Tango Film, Rialto Film

Technical Specs

Runtime:

104 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Part of the BRD Trilogy along with The Marriage of Maria Braun (1978) and Lola (1981). "BRD" stands for Bundesrepublik Deutschland, the official name of West Germany and of the united contemporary Germany, period in which those three stories takes place.

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Goofs

The film is set in 1955 but the song "The Battle of New Orleans" by Johnny Horton, released in 1959, is heard on the radio a number of times.

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Quotes

Veronika Voss: You've given me a great deal of happiness.
Dr. Marianne Katz: I sold it to you.

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Connections

Featured in Fassbinder (2015)

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Soundtracks

The Battle Of New Orleans
Written by Jimmie Driftwood (as Jimmy Driftwood)
Performed by Johnny Horton

User Reviews

The search for congealed history

Rainer Werner Fassbinder's second-but-last film does not show primarily the life and downfall of the UFA-star Sybille Schmitz, but gives, at the hand of the Schmitz-inspired, yet fictive character Veronika Voss an unvarnished and hopeless picture of the Bundesrepublik Germany in the 50ies. Part of Fassbinder's "BRD-Trilogy", it is also one of his 4 "women"-films, besides "Lola", "Maria Braun", and "Lili Marleen".

It is hard to say if the main focus of this movie is the former UFA-star Veronika Voss or the sports reporter Robert Krohn. One rainy night, he meets, in a little forest amidst of Berlin, a crying little bundle of mensch who seems to have completely lost her orientation. She is not so much thankful for his help but astonished that he does not recognize her: the great Veronika Voss. After he accompanies the woman to her door, she continues to occupy his mind. He asks his older colleagues who confirm him that she was once a movies' super-star, but now forgotten, divorced, impoverished, addicted and out of work. Soon, they meet again, and between Krohn, who is in a steady liaison, and Veronika, who sees in him one of her once many admirers, a very problematic love story starts which costs two humans' lives, leaves an investigative mind back in despair, discloses the corruption between medicine and politics and portrays the deterrent situation in the post-war German film industry which used his former flagships as fuel.

R.W. Fassbinder got for this films the "Golden Bear" out of the hand of Jimmy Stewart who was his friend for many years. Fassbinder had been nominated for the highest German film price since a long time, but it was Stewart who realized that soon it might come too late. Fassbinder passed away only a few days after having received the Golden Bear.