Baader-meinhof, RAF - C/D?

Luke Haines' Baader-Meinhof record is also G*R*A*T*E in a strung out pseudo funk kind of way.

http://www.eastcoastghost.com/rosse.jpg

nerrrr. it's accurate enough, but it does treat the story almost like that of a rock band. It's a bit blind to the fact that the RAF did actually kill people.

have you seen this website yet: http://www.baader-meinhof.com/ ?

Can't say I'm too surprised to hear that.

i don't know what vague does now: i wd be hesitant to rely on any particular fact in the mags or the book, though i think the project was undertaken seriously and honestly, and gives a (fairly) reliable general overall perspective (at the very least a solid feel for the "undergrounder perspective-of-the-time"... ie back in the mid/late 70s when Time Out was full of angry conspiracy theories abt the RAF etc)

He still publishes books occasionally. He wrote a companion volume to the RAF one called "Anarchy In The UK" about the Angry Brigade. He's been involved in some publication concerning King Mob too.

Some of the stuff he calls psychogeography (which methodologically probably isn't, strictly speaking, but who cares) is tremendous writing. I haqve very fond memories of the last Vague in particular ("The West 11 Days of My Life").

I think "Televisionaries" is the only readily available account in english of the RAF, although you might see old copies of the sensationalist right-wing book "Hitler's Children" in libraries.

It's a political pendulum! *grin* (Really, more ideological pendulum, but "ideological" doesn't start with the letter "p" so phooey on it. Kidding.)

Anyway, I'm not exactly a fan of terrorist organizations, so a big fat hearty dud on this one. Even with all the stories. </fun-killer>

http://www.kurtuluscephesi.com/raf/raflogo1.gif

You could always hitch your star to the Angry Brigade, who had sense enough to go out of their way to not even appear to threaten anyone's little toe... but then they were co-opted by that BBC thirtysomethingish miniseries a few years back. Oh, what the heck, just revert back to the Situationists and call it a day.

the state will be destroyed by the weapons of the state.

So, what did people think of the film? I liked it.

does it have US distribution yet? can't find any info

I had a few hours to kill on Thursday evening, passed a cinema and was going to go in and see it, but got put off by the reviews - it sounded like one of those films that are more collection-of-things-that-happened than a good story, which is what I was really needing. Annoyingly, that bit of impromptu research meant that I didn't notice until too late that Waltz With Bashir was on on the other screen, and I really do fancy seeing that. Not to worry though, I got to watch the Portsmouth-Milan game instead, and it was great.

(sorry, that doesn't answer your question at all)

The story is good enough, though by closely following actual events it maybe lacks the convenient narrative cohesion that fiction might have. Even with that, I reckon you could watch this as a film about crazy ultra leftists getting steadily crazier.

loved the film. sections are breathtaking, especially that first hour. the narrative gets a little crammed in the final hour and required a little patience, but there's no other way to depict the history when all your main characters are going crazy in prison and the explosive violence is being perpetrated by a random series of new recruits, so it makes for a very very confusing story. but it's a relief how balanced this is; the first hour makes their personal shortcomings clear, but then the documentary footage and 70's clips of all the political violence around the world really drives home why there was so much popular support for the RAF. I'm glad I saw it in the theatre, though the US DVD is probably right around the corner

I need to see more of the actual footage, though. I don't even know of any feature length documentaries in English, are there any recommendations?

Milton - where did you see it?

Embarcadero SF, I think it's there for one more week.

there is goodness in the film, but it races through everything so fast that most of the characters end up non-entities.

i wanted to see this, i wonder if it's coming to a theatre near me

did some digging, this looks like a thing. Kraftwerk / Can for the soundtrack (should have been Faust, but I haven't watched the whole thing yet)

"Baader-Meinhof: In Love with Terror" by Ben Lewis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5XoNFt8Uh0&feature=related

'the baader meinhof complex' is shit. just a completely dull film.

'more collection-of-things-that-happened than a good story' is about right – it's just a chronicle, lacking in any kind of perspective. the bruno ganz character's bollocks about 'hey if we only listened to them, then...' is particularly yawnsome message-peddling.

pretty meat-and-potatoes as filmmaking, too, and despite myself slogans about 'the spectacle' come to mind when seeing reconstructions of political demos, etc.

It's playing in Berkeley ... might see this tonight.

it's on Netflix now

Really want to see this.

In the 70's my dad was in a building when it was bombed by Baader Meinhof!

It was the second bombing of the IG Farben building, iirc.

Finally got around to seeing this and I did like it quite a bit despite it petering out in the last third. At the end Baader sounds like a whiny old hipster complaining about how new people are "ruining the scene man."

Perhaps the film's final third is intentional and the RAF was really only just empty dime store Gramsci rhetoric used as an excuse to steal Porsches, rob banks, kill fascists, and make out with hot anarchist girls.

Edel's film is OK, but I prefer a bit more art and less docudrama.

Am looking forward to finally seeing this, have heard good things.

DVD streets on 3/3!

it was entertaining in my opinion

Me too. Not sure if seeing it just a little bit after A Grin Without A Cat improved it or not.

It's showing in LA again this week (at the Egyptian). Might go see it again

this was pretty good. rather dizzying at first, but that's appropriate.

Alexandra Maria Lara's role is too small :'-( <3

i wasn't talking about the film, i was talking about the bombings!

j/k

i just saw the movie. i didn't know anything about baader meinhof before last night. wow, what an insane story.

Haven't seen the Edel film, but this might be a good follow-up: http://www.ubu.com/film/bruch_schleyer.html

Love how these dudes used BMWs to get around in to spread Socialist revolution and shoot cops and all that.

They used BMWs so the cops wouldn't stop them, dumbass.

Looking for artificial viewer-created hypocrisy in order to denounce someone's ideals is soooo 1998, i.e. over.

They used BMWs so the cops wouldn't stop them, dumbass.

Totally worked when a cop stopped them for speeding. And they shot the cop. Dumbshit.

Hey, you gotta play the odds.

Also, that has nothing to do with your original attempt to smear them with the hypocrisy brush, all of a sudden you're criticizing their tactical decisions.

Stick to remixes of "Sororah T Massacre Suck A Dick"

this thread might be too real for me.

anyway, enjoyed the movie!

that has nothing to do with your original attempt to smear them with the hypocrisy brush

I was applauding their good taste, champ.

all of a sudden you're criticizing their tactical decisions.

Because they had many and obvious tactical flaws. But on the other side of the coin, I will admit they had a few triumphs (Baader's escape from custody being a great example).

Stick to remixes of "Sororah T Massacre Suck A Dick"

We got that David Guetta bloke lined up for a mix, should be a banger.

remember chicks being hot but passion of joan of arc references were a bit too far and it all left me a little cold.

yeah it was a bit over the top at times,

but like i didn't even know anything about the whole baader meinhof story so i was just continually in the "holy shit this ACTUALLY HAPPENED" mode

i think this movie painted these folks w/a pretty good hypocrisy brush! vv good film imo.

http://www.ubu.com/film/meinhof_bambule.html

embedded version has no subtitles, have to download the .avi and the separate link for that

must admit I haven't seen it yet. I'm almost just posting this here for someone else to watch it and advise? ha.

Another movie on the way, this one mostly about Ensslin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBafuYa0qlA

carlos really made this movie look like the tv biopic it was

(i know carlos was technically a tv biopic)

Film was on last night, "The Baader-Meinhof Complex" that is, missed most of it but I'd ssen it before anyway. Couldn't help thinking they turned into a bunch of whiny losers by the end. Their treatment by the West German authorities didn't seem all that heinous (Holger Meins apart), not like being an IRA prisoner (or internee) at the same time! And if they found their living conditions cramped and intolerable, try renting in London frankly.

I'm planning a RAF film festival, to include showings of:

Germany in Autumn
Die Bleierne Zeit (the Marguerite von Trotha one)
The Baader-Meinhof Complex
If Not Us, Who
The Third Generation

I feel there are a few more that I am forgetting. But I think we definitely could show more films than there were first-wave members of the RAF.

IIRC 'Carlos' also touches briefly on the RAF/Baader Meinhof groups.

I feel there are a few more that I am forgetting

The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum

... and possibly...

Mother Küsters' Trip to Heaven

... also possible, though it's not very good tbh...

The Niklashausen Journey

Katja Blum is prob the only one I would go watch a second time

did some digging, this looks like a thing. Kraftwerk / Can for the soundtrack (should have been Faust, but I haven't watched the whole thing yet

No, shoulda been Amon Duul I/II! It's a München thang.

>... also possible, though it's not very good tbh...
>
>The Niklashausen Journey

I like this one! give me a quickie response to Godard's Weekend updated for Baader-Meinhof any day of the week. it's a little slow but the parts that work are true surprises and most of the dialog is over the top, and you can't really get the slapstick comedy of The Third Generation without first seeing his early sympathies

Carlos more than briefly touches on it - shows that RAF were one of any number of groups in the 70s that were up to 'stuff', gives it an internationalist perspective.

Yvonne Rainer - Journeys from Berlin/1971, is another one, more of an essay-film.

Alexander Kluge - The Patriot - more of an analysis of Germany's relationshp w/her own recent past, but certainly relevant to the RAF.

I've remembered another one! "Children of the Revolution", an Irish-directed documentary about Ulrike Meinhof's daughter and the daughter of one of the Japanese Red Army. They are quite interesting to compare and contrast, with the JRA woman's daughter being much more sympathetic to her mother's worldview (growing up in a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon might do that to you).

Slightly off-topic, but does anyone know of a good book (in English) about the Japanese Red Army? There seem to a lot more of their first wavers still alive than with the RAF, and the surviving ones seem a lot less mental than surviving RAFers like Horst Mahler.

Koji Wakamatsu: United Red Army.

Can anyone recommend any good books which give an overview of the the European/American radical leftist movements of the 1970s?

In particular something more wide-ranging and internationalist than 'The Baader Meinhof Complex' by Stefan Aust.

Although it's fiction, would recommend Hari Kunzru's 'My Revolutions' for a good immersive experience in period detail. It's set in London mainly.

this is pretty much what you're looking for: Bringing the War Home: The Weather Underground, the Red Army Faction, and Revolutionary Violence in the Sixties and Seventies

Yeah, that looks like the kind of thing. Will also check out the Kunzru book down the line.