Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

Merolliv I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

Julio Kortazar Although this film has abundant imagery that is inspired in post WWII Germany, people watching this movie should not forget that it's entertainment. For example, in the bar scenes there are only black American soldiers and they are all dancing with Aryan damsels in distress, as if the full occupying American army was made up only of black guys! That was laughable. On the one hand, the bar scene could be trying to stoke that old Germanic paranoia about barbaric heathens ready to take over the motherland OR maybe the intent of the bar scene is to poke fun at that paranoia. There are plenty of other scenes throughout the movie where one is also left wondering what was the real message being sent.

rory-campbell Maria Braun is an extraordinary woman presented fully and very credibly, despite being so obtuse as to border on implausibility. She will do everything to make her marriage work, including shameless opportunism and sexual manipulation. And thus beneath the vicey exterior, she reveals a rather sweet value system. The film suffers from an abrupt and unexpected ending which afterwards feels wholly inadequate, with the convenience familiar from ending your school creative writing exercise with 'and then I woke up'. It is also book-ended at the other end with the most eccentric title sequence I've ever seen, but don't let any of that put you off.

D A Sporadically this does demonstrate masterful dialog and especially finely crafted direction from the distinguished German filmmaker, but summing it's entirety as a masterpiece feels way overpraised. There seems to be almost as much dead weight being carried around in The Marriage of Maria Braun as there is subtle grace.Thankfully to aid Fassbinder's articulate work is lead (and apparent muse) Hanna Schygulla. Her transformation, however underhanded in pace, is entertaining to behold and probably one of the stronger female performances of the time. She exudes a sensuality better suited for long pauses then line recitals, but overall does an admirable job through and through.Purists may revel in it's technical pronunciations and metaphoric finesse, but a certain emotional detachment lingers the entire time- contrary to what the script would imply. Don't let the typical European surprise shock ending and over-theorized allegorical conjecture fool you into calling this a masterpiece, it is still just a reasonably well made journey into the female psyche of post-war Germany.

ravcsv54-1 This film exhibits artful cinematic techniques wherein instead of landscape capturing the attention of the camera it is small details in how someone appears, how the woman may be wearing a cocktail hat and wrapped in a sheet. How the husband may be wearing a hat and socks and shoes and his underwear and both seem so completely at ease and comfortable. How provocative the woman is posed is another feature of the tableau that the director chooses to let us know she is a free spirit sexually and aims to get the pleasure she seeks without flirting directly or with any particular sensitivity to what the man may be feeling. The relationship between the wife and husband is unique. It is an open one wherein she holds nothing back, feels no particular shame for how she has behaved and wants to share these facts with him because her primary focus always is on the fact of their marriage. Nothing and no one can come between the two of them. Only the chances of fate can intervene---his imprisonment during the war and what follows after his return at long last. A very intriguing film which is totally absorbing.