One of the greatest movie scores
Unhinged, grotesque, impulsive, sadistic, disturbing and very realistic! Some of the kills are very generic and almost fade into the background. What's really terrifying is it really takes you into the mindset of a psychotic killer, with a monologue of the killer's thoughts and disturbing backstory. The camera movements are absolutely brilliant they follow the killer's moods, if he's chaotic the camera's chaotic. The score is one of the best i've heard it stayed in my head for a while. The acting is almost too good, this guy really knows how to act as a psychopath it's scary. What's even more terrifying is people like that actually exist. I'll never look at someone eating a sausage the same way again.
Angst is like a virgin coup d'état: amateurish and revolutionary at the same time.
While much of the production (especially the acting and story) looks and feels like it was a film school project (even considering the film was made in the early 80s), things like the lack of any real narrative arc and the way the director (Gerald Kargl, and this is his sole feature-length film) used a 'SnorriCam' (a device that attaches the camera to a rig attached to the body of the person it's filming, unheard of at the time) make this odd slasher film a cut above the rest.
A man with sadistic urges gets out of prison and lets himself go one more time. That’s it. "Angst" might lack substance for most audiences, and its graphic moments have definitely lost their impact thirty years later. Yet, it still deserves a place in my heart as it’s a masterclass on how to create a truly visceral and disturbing mood by solely relying on cinematography. Trivial moments like a man eating sausages end up being more impactful than actual violence. The camera work was definitely ahead of its time and works as the main source of the intoxicating nature of the film. I can’t comment on the deadpan inner monologues as I am no native speaker, but it felt like they could alienate the audience even further.
Don't get the love here. Good sound, interesting story, boring af. Good on ya if you love the classics. I just didn't find this to be one of them.
Review by JordyVIP 8BlockedParent2023-09-07T22:44:47Z
Really simple and to the point, but none of that matters when you can squeeze that much emotion into such a short runtime. Visually, I would call this a masterpiece. I can tell you at least five directors who were directly influenced by this film stylistically (e.g. Aronofsky, Haneke, Noé) which is probably because it’s so good at portraying subjectivity through the editing, lighting and camerawork. The score is also really great, taking clear cues from the Berlin school of electronic music, which fits really well with the tone and atmosphere of the rest of the film. The film understands that true horror is conveyed through filmmaking and atmosphere, not dumb loud noises or cheap shock value. It has its fucked up moments, but they’re not over the top. The acting by Erwin Leder is excellent and he’s completely believable as this emotionally unhinged individual. The film presents us with a character study of his mind, and while it succeeds, there are some clear issues with the exposition. For example, the film starts with this inelegant information dump giving us the backstory of our character, which is unnecessary for this particular story. There’s also continuous inner monologuing throughout the film, which you also don’t need because Leder’s performance already communicates most of what’s being said. It’s like the filmmakers were afraid of the main character potentially being uninteresting, and I don’t get that because everything else is handled with such confidence.
8.5/10