Katz und Maus
Germany
Shown in 1967
CREDITS
- dir
-
Hansjurgen Pohland
- scr
-
Gunter Grass
- cam
-
Wolf Wirth
- cast
-
Lars Brandt, Peter Brandt, Wolfgang Neuss, Claudia Bremer, Herbert Weissbach, Michael Hinz, Helmut Kircher
- prod co
-
Gloria; Modern Art; Film Polski
- source
-
Modern Art Film, Berlin
-
COMMENTS
Hansjurgen Pohland in person.
OTHER
Gunter Grass' novel, one of postwar Germany's most successful and controversial literary works, has proven to be just as provocative on the screen. It tells the story of Joachim Mahlke, a German high school boy during the Third Reich. He is a gawky, inept outsider, terribly self-conscious about his epic Adam's apple, a protrusion best hidden (so he feels) by a military trophy—like the German Iron Cross. Exactly how Joachim obtains this medal is the basis for this satirical film. The director has taken it for granted that everyone has read the novel, which may cause some confusion, for the narrative flow is experimental, restless and extremely mad. The intellectual premise, one that equates inferiority complexes with military distinction, is strictly in line with contemporary feelings about warfare, and the denouement is bitter, symbolic and up-to-you. The most publicized irony about Cat and Mouse is that the role of Joachim is enacted by the twin sons of Vice Chancellor Willy Brandt, with one playing the schoolboy and the other Joachim-as-soldier. The youths create a single image of jolly, grotesque caricature, and altogether Cat and Mouse is an engrossing avant-garde comedy, in which the anarchic spirit laughs at the follies of men through this portrait of the soldier as a young fool.
—Albert Johnson
FACTOID #177
In 2000 animator Faith Hubley was the recipient of the Persistence of Vision Award. One year later, her daughter Emily appeared at the Festival with her bandmates, Yo La Tengo, to perform a score accompanying the silent underwater films of Jean Painlevé.
