Der Todesking (1990)
Genre: Horror / Drama
Duration: 80 minuten
Alternative title: The Death King
Country:
West Germany
Directed by: Jörg Buttgereit
Starst: Heinrich Ebber, Angelika Hoch and Hermann Kopp
IMDb score:
6,3 (3.210)
Releasedate: 25 January 1990
Der Todesking plot
Seven episodes on the theme of suicide and violent death. Each episode is linked to a chain letter, whoever receives it will die that same week.
Reviews & comments
leatherhead
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- 3556 messages
- 1813 votes
The best I've seen from Buttgereit so far, but still a bit mediocre. His films always have something interesting and this Todesking also has a fascinating concept as a basis, but it is the execution that is somewhat underwhelming. Actually, only the first and last segments are worth watching, everything in between left me emotionally quite cold. I certainly don't mind the minimalist design without too much gore, but there needs to be a catchy atmosphere or something similar in return, which I'm really only discovering here piecemeal. The (suicide) scenes themselves are not very uplifting, the visual style is quite boring and dry, the soundtrack is slightly better but sometimes a bit annoying. Especially those eternal intermediate segments with that decomposing corpse and irritating tune, they should have deleted them in their entirety.
There are quite an interesting scene here and there, the concept ensures that it never really gets annoying and fortunately it doesn't last too long, but otherwise a film that is a lot better on paper than the final product. 2.5*
Translated from Dutch · View original
Collins
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- 7452 messages
- 4430 votes
Seven times the last hour. Seven times the last minutes before the final earthly end. The theme of suicide is discussed in seven stories. Der Todesking shows characters who are alienated from earthly existence and would like to say goodbye to it. The film shows the suffering that accompanies dying in seven extremely boring stories. The stories are surrounded by artistry and have an experimental character. Underneath the videos there is a repetitive dreamy music that exceeds the irritation limit after a while.
They are depressing videos. In the director's view, it is probably not compelling enough to move the viewer. Better to be sure, he must have thought. And so at no point is the viewer allowed to forget the decay of the material. Between the films, the viewer can therefore marvel at an increasingly decomposed corpse. It is delightful poetry. Jörg Buttgereit is the director's name. A quick look at his oeuvre. Well, very preoccupied with death, it seems. Not very interesting.
Der Todesking. I didn't like it one bit.
Translated from Dutch · View originalLatest News
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