Meat (1979)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Movie
Original title flesh
Country of production Germany
original language German
Publishing year 1979
length 114 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Rainer Erler
script Rainer Erler
music Eugene Thomass
camera Wolfgang Grasshoff ,
Wolf Bachmann
cut Hilwa from Boro
occupation

Fleisch is a thriller by director Rainer Erler from 1979, which takes up the subject of organ trafficking . The film was produced by Pentagramma on behalf of ZDF and it was first broadcast on television on May 21, 1979. In 2007, ProSieben produced a remake of the same name under the director Oliver Schmitz .

action

The newlyweds Mike, an American, and Monica, a German, who are studying together at Princeton , stop at a cheap motel in Las Cruces , New Mexico, on their honeymoon . After a shepherd's hour , they go for a walk where Mike is overwhelmed by paramedics and kidnapped in an ambulance . Monica just manages to escape, scantily clad, and is chased through the prairie by the ambulance.

The boss of the motel seems to be in league with the kidnappers and tries to stop Monica. She informs the kidnappers, whereupon Monica escapes again and stops a truck on a nearby highway, whose driver Bill takes her with him. At first he doesn't believe the frightened Monica her crazy story, but soon they both trust each other more and Bill wants to help her find Mike.

In doing so, they track down an internationally branched syndicate that deals in organ trade on a large scale. In a special clinic in Roswell , organs are removed from kidnapped, anesthetized tourists without being asked. Jackson and her assistant sold for a lot of money through organ banks to wealthy patients with organ defects. In search of Mike, Monica and Bill manage to penetrate this ominous specialist clinic. To do this, they kidnap one of the "delivery vans" and pretend to be an ambulance driver and an accompanying nurse. With the slogan: I bring meat for Dr. Jackson. they get access to the clinic without any problems, but Monica cannot find Mike. For this she comes with Dr. Jackson in contact, but does not know that she is the boss because she did not suspect a woman in this position. Jackson proudly shows her her clinic and in return Monica tells her that she is looking for her boyfriend. Although the woman is very matter-of-fact and cool, she seems to impress Monica's courage. She arranges that Monica and Bill can accompany a flight of organ donors, including Mike. She trusts that the two now know how to help each other. However, the on-board staff has not been informed and wants to use the opportunity to "utilize" the two as additional organ donors. But Monica manages to escape when the plane lands at its destination New York. Desperate and aimless, she runs through the city and is picked up by a detective. She tells him her story and thus arouses his interest. She does not know that this man has already informed and that Dr. Jackson came to New York for volunteering for the police. Ready to testify as a key witness against the organization she involuntarily got into three years ago, she is now helping first to rescue Mike and Bill from the clutches of this mafia. She uses the authority of her person and has the two patients brought out of the clinic. While she makes sure that Monica and the men are safe, she tries to distract her pursuers, but dies in the process.

background

The American thriller Coma, filmed by Michael Crichton based on the book by Robin Cook , dealt with the topic of organ donation / organ trafficking in a similar way in 1978 .

Locations

Filming took place on location in the United States . At the beginning of the film, the wedding scene was shot on the campus of Princeton University in New Jersey . The Honeymoon Inn motel was located at 3995 West Picacho Avenue on the outskirts of Las Cruces , New Mexico . The scene at Dr. Jackson's Transplant Center was filmed at Roswell Airport . The escape scenes in New York were made a. a. at the amusement parks of Coney Island and on the New York City subway . Other scenes in New York were filmed on the northeastern edge of Central Park and on Roosevelt Island .

Broadcasts

After the first broadcast on May 21, 1979 at 9:20 p.m. on ZDF, the film was shown in German cinemas on September 27, 1979. Cinema use in the GDR started with great success on November 27, 1981. The performance rights for the GDR cinemas expired in July 1986. In the GDR cinema, the film was shown in a slightly shortened version that tightened the plot. So were z. B. cut out the long driving scenes after the truck driver Bill took the girl Monica and unloaded his cargo in New York.

On July 16, 1988, it was first broadcast on GDR television. The long driving scenes that had been removed for cinema use were included here. However, it was cut elsewhere for the television broadcast. At the beginning of the film, when the young couple arrives at the motel, a short conversation between Monica and the landlady was cut to include the exact passages in which the girl says she comes “from Germany, I'm a herb, a Fritz, a lady ". The short sentence of the truck driver Bill, in which he said to Monica that he came "from Poland", fell victim to the GDR censorship scissors. This shortened version was also shown for repetition on television that was still in the GDR as a film of your choice in January / February 1990.

But even on ZDF, Fleisch was not broadcast in full. All of the scenes that were cut in the GDR were included, but the scenes that played in a music studio before the opening credits were missing for about a minute at the beginning. The film began immediately with the opening credits for all broadcasts on ZDF. Further broadcasts on ZDF took place on October 30, 1982 at 11:05 p.m. and on June 16, 1989 at 11:25 p.m.

The film has been available in full on DVD since April 10, 2003.

Reactions

At that time, meat caused a real shock in parts of the audience and subsequently led to vehement protests from the medical profession, who sensed the mood and saw wild prejudices nurtured. The film, which was shown in cinemas in over 120 countries, is now considered a "classic of the socially critical television film of those years and a milestone in the work of the great prophet Rainer Erler".

Film music

Eugen Thomass provided the film music . The song How much is anyone worth sang Ron Williams alias Ronnie Lee Williams , who also took on a supporting role as a singer in the opening scene of the film.

Reviews

“Erler illustrates these fears about this medical technology, brings them out of the realm of the unconscious. Films like these use the genuine possibilities of art to paint what is possible so precisely that it takes on the character of the real for people. In a playful way, so to speak, viewers can anticipate situations and simulate decisions that reality may later demand of them. Anyone who wants to curtail this possibility with armed protests locks fiction in the here and now and makes it superfluous. "

- Michael Schwarze, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

"Erler's film staged for television gives away all opportunities between committed social criticism and exciting action entertainment due to its uninspired production and its overly constructed script."

- Lexicon of international film

Awards

novel

Rainer Erler processed Fleisch's script into a novel that was originally published by Goldmann-Verlag. A revised new edition was published by Shayol Verlag in 2006 ( ISBN 3926126574 ).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Not without my kidney , Die Welt, February 16, 2008
  2. ↑ a b Lahme Organräuber , Der Tagesspiegel from February 17, 2008
  3. ↑ Do you have a kidney? , Der Spiegel from February 18, 2008
  4. ^ Meat in the Lexicon of International Films

Web links