Fox
and His Friends (Rainer Werner Fassbinder) 1975
I
imagine it’s probably best if I preface this review of Rainer Werner
Fassbinder’s Fox and His Friends with the disclaimer that I’ve never
previously seen any of the director’s work. Still, it’s hard not to see from
just this one film that Fassbinder is a distinctive and bold cinematic voice.
It’s no wonder that he is considered by many to be a master director. In the
wonderfully original Fox, Fassbinder himself plays the lead role, and
slides effortlessly into the world that he’s created. The film follows young
Fox, a gay carnival sideshow freak who finds his fortunes changed when he wins
500,000 Marks in the lottery. The most surprising thing about Fassbinder’s
vision is the matter-of-fact way in which he presents his predominantly gay
cast. Instead of using gay characters to make a message movie that asserts they
are somehow braver or better than straight folks, he does the opposite, allowing
them their status as a fringe culture, but denying them the romantic notion that
their place outside the norm gives them perspective that the masses lack. He
insists that they are just as capable of being petty, exploitative, and
bourgeois as the rest of humanity. Now that’s equality!
One
of the great observations of Fox and His Friends is the speed with which
the acquirement of money turns its protagonist into someone who believes that
his money can buy his happiness. Though Fox doesn’t exactly become a big
spender through his own accord (Eugen, his opportunistic boyfriend makes most of
his purchasing decisions for him), it’s only because he assumes he is too
stupid to make those decisions for himself that he gives away that power. Though
Fox initially seems in command of his relationship with Eugen - notice his
sexual dominance of him early on - a passive aggressive series of demeaning
insults (“We’ll make a human being of you yet.”) that he endures gradually
wear down his resolve. Eugen’s avaricious attraction to Fox is so apparent to
the audience that the film could be scarcely be called a melodrama. Melodramas
usually have an element of surprise built in that stunts the audience’s hopes.
Not for a moment does Fassbinder indulge our fantasies that Fox’s tryst might
be working toward a happy ending.
The
movie is more interesting than a conventional melodrama, though, since its
presentation is so original and thought-through. The way that Fassbinder’s
camera pans from a haughty Eugen as he mocks Fox to their fabulously ornate bed
(which is far more expensive than the bed that Eugen had before he met Fox)
makes us question where Eugen’s pretension come from. Description as a
melodrama would also belie the movie’s myriad humorous touches, which mock
those pretensions and the willingness with which they are adopted. Perhaps the
funniest, and most outrageous scene, takes place in the Marrakesh Holiday Inn.
After Fox and Eugen bring back a strapping Arab to their hotel room for a
threesome, they are informed by one of the hotel’s Arab employees that Arab
visitors are not allowed on hotel property. With a bit of petulant indignation,
the couple turns their friend away and scorns the worker for his conflict of
interest. To console his angry guests, the worker offers one of the staff boys
to them! The scene is brilliant because it works on the same principle as the
rest of the film, and shows how their eagerness to have a conventional response
is completely at odds with their unconventional behavior. Another highlight
occurs in the scenes where Eugen takes Fox home for dinner with his parents. The
embarrassment that Eugen feels from witnessing Fox’s uncouth behavior feels cribbed from an infinite
number of movies that featured straight protagonists. The bravery that
Fassbinder exhibits as he comically flirts with taboo subject matter is
precisely what positions him as one that is qualified to make this sort of
cultural judgment.
If
it’s tough to argue with Fassbinder’s assessment of fringe culture, it’s a
bit disturbing how easily it leads to a rather dim and reductive view of
humanity. Since he presents a story told in the milieu of a minority that wants to be like a
majority about a minor man who wants to become a major one, he gives the
impression that such behavior is universal and there isn’t a single person that could exist beyond his
disdain. Fox himself is utterly guileless, and even in the scenes where we
should be rooting for him the most, such as the one in which his new friends
urge him to reject his sister, it’s tough to do so (this time because she’s
drunk and obnoxious). Every man seems out for himself here, and since that’s
the case, none seem any better or worse than the rest. To be a minority isn’t
reason enough for sympathy, Fassbinder seems to say, since the minority would
act as the majority does if positions were to change. An early playful argument
between Fox and Eugen about which one of them is “the girl” initially seems
to have only its obvious practical sexual implications, but by the end of the
film, it becomes apparent that those semantics reveal a lot about how it is that
these characters define themselves in straight people’s terms. Fassbinder sees
nothing but folly in that kind of self-perception, because it is inherently
contradictory.Fox and His
Friends works best as a comedy, because it truly manages to create a world
where every individual and every individual interest is patently absurd since it
follows similar lines.
