Dying of Laughter (4 Stars)

"Muertos de Risa" (engl. "Dying of laughter") is one of Alex de la Iglesia's sharpest and most uncomfortable black comedies; it takes the format of a Spanish TV comedy double act and slowly poisons it from the inside.

The film follows Nino and Bruno, two comedians whose career is built on mutual humiliation, timing and a very public sense of cruelty that the audience keeps rewarding. What starts as satire about celebrity culture and the mechanics of laughter gradually turns into something darker and more claustrophobic, as success hardens into obsession and dependency.

What makes it work is the tonal control. "Muertos de Risa" never fully lets you relax into either comedy or tragedy; it keeps slipping between the two, often in the same scene. The humour is real but it always feels a bit contaminated, like you’re laughing at something that’s already turning sour.

The film is also about Spain's own transformation. The older entertainment culture, shaped in the late Franco and immediate post-Franco years of the 1970's, relied on shared references, collective humour and a sense of social constraint. By the 1990's, that world has been replaced by aggressive media visibility, celebrity obsession and a television landscape that rewards extremity over subtlety. Nino and Bruno feel like products of that shift; they start in a world where performance is communal and end in one where it’s entirely predatory.

Alex de la Iglesia captures that transition with typical excess and discomfort. The film suggests that Spain’s move from a more contained, post-dictatorship culture into a modern media society didn't just change what people watched; it changed what they were willing to do to each other in public for attention.

Meet Joe Black (5 Stars)

"Meet Joe Black" is a Hollywood film that seemed faintly ridiculous to many critics when it first appeared, then slowly gathered a devoted audience who responded to its sincerity. At more than three hours long, with Brad Pitt playing Death in human form, it could easily have collapsed into self-parody. Instead, it became something strangely hypnotic; a melancholy romantic fantasy about mortality, wealth, loneliness and the terror of time running out.

The premise sounds absurd. A media tycoon named William Parrish is approached by Death, who arrives in the body of a young man and calls himself Joe Black. Death wants to experience human life before taking Parrish away. What follows isn't really a fantasy story in the conventional sense; it's a meditation on ageing, regret, romance and the awareness that time is limited.

The film works because director Martin Brest refuses to rush anything. Conversations unfold slowly. Characters pause before speaking. Entire scenes exist purely for atmosphere. The famous hospital and coffee-shop opening stretches time almost to breaking point, establishing the dreamlike rhythm that defines the entire film.

Anthony Hopkins gives the film its emotional gravity. His William Parrish isn't simply frightened of death; he's exhausted by power, responsibility and the compromises of success. Hopkins plays him as a man already halfway detached from the world before Joe even arrives.

Brad Pitt gives one of the oddest performances of his career. His flat vocal rhythms and awkward body language were mocked in 1998, but viewed now they make sense. Joe Black isn't human. He's observing people the way an outsider studies behaviour he doesn't entirely understand. Pitt plays him with a childlike curiosity mixed with something ancient and unknowable.

The emotional structure of the film depends heavily on the contrast between the two daughters.

Susan Parrish, played by Claire Forlani, is introspective, romantic and emotionally restless. Despite her privileged life, she seems disconnected from the corporate world surrounding her family. She wants intimacy and authenticity rather than social success. That's why she's drawn to Joe. Even before she understands what he is, she senses that he exists outside the artificial systems that dominate her world.

Allison, played by Marcia Gay Harden, represents stability and ordinary human attachment. She's practical, maternal and socially grounded. Unlike Susan, she isn't searching for transcendence or mystery. Allison accepts life as something to organise and preserve; Susan searches for something emotionally absolute. William loves both daughters deeply, but the contrast between them reflects two different responses to mortality itself. Allison embraces life as routine continuity; Susan searches for meaning beyond routine.

Over time the film has developed something close to cult status, although not in the traditional midnight-movie sense. It was always a large studio production with major stars, but its reputation has transformed. Younger audiences have rediscovered it through streaming and online clips, especially the coffee-shop sequence and the unexpectedly funny peanut butter scene. What audiences once considered unbearably earnest now feels refreshing. The film's refusal to be cynical has become part of its appeal.

The question of length has followed the film ever since its release. The original theatrical cut runs just over three hours. There was later a shortened release for use on television and for video rentals. On paper, the shorter version seems sensible. The corporate takeover subplot is reduced, several extended dinner conversations are tightened and some atmospheric transitional scenes disappear entirely.

Narratively, very little is lost. The shortened version still tells the same story clearly. In fact, viewers who found the original ponderous often prefer it because the romantic and supernatural elements become more prominent once the business material is compressed.

Yet something important vanishes with those cuts. The full-length version creates a sensation of suspended time. The slow pacing allows Death to drift through the Parrish household like a visitor studying humanity in microscopic detail. Even scenes that appear unnecessary contribute to the mood of lingering impermanence. The shortened version preserves the plot, but weakens the hypnotic atmosphere.

That's why the theatrical cut continues to attract devoted admirers despite its excesses. Many individual scenes could be removed without damaging the mechanics of the story, but the emotional experience depends on accumulation. The film gradually surrounds the viewer with the awareness of mortality. Its power comes less from narrative momentum than from emotional duration.

In the end, "Meet Joe Black" endures because it attempts something modern Hollywood rarely risks anymore; it treats romance, death and longing with complete seriousness. Sometimes it stumbles under the weight of its ambitions. Sometimes it's undeniably self-indulgent. But even its flaws feel connected to what makes it memorable. The film moves at the pace of someone reluctantly saying goodbye to life itself.

Success Rate:  - 0.4

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City of Angels (5 Stars)

"City of Angels" is a remake of a German film that's so well made that most people don't even realise it's a remake. It's a rare Hollywood remake that completely understands what it needs to change. Rather than trying to imitate "Wings of Desire" scene for scene, it transforms the original's philosophical melancholy into something more openly emotional and romantic. If Wim Wenders' film is about observation, loneliness and the burden of eternity, "City of Angels" is about feeling; immediate, painful, human feeling.

It can be summed up in one sentence: "Wings of Desire" is a film for the head, while "City of Angels" is a film for the heart.

Wenders fills Berlin with angels who listen silently to the thoughts of strangers. His film drifts through divided Germany like a poem about history, memory and alienation. The angels are fascinated by humanity but remain detached from it, and the black-and-white photography creates the sense that they're trapped outside life itself. It's a deeply intellectual film, one that asks what it means to exist rather than merely observe.

"City of Angels" strips away much of that philosophical weight and replaces it with romantic tragedy. Nicolas Cage plays Seth not as an abstract observer, but as someone already emotionally vulnerable before he falls in love. His relationship with Meg Ryan becomes the centre of the film in a way that the romance never entirely does in Wenders' version. The remake isn't concerned with the political or spiritual condition of a city; it's concerned with the intensity of human connection, and the pain that inevitably comes with it.

That's why Los Angeles matters so much as a replacement for Berlin. Wenders' Berlin is haunted by history and division. The Los Angeles of "City of Angels" feels weightless by comparison; full of sunlight, hospitals, beaches and empty freeways. The angels no longer wander through a wounded nation wrestling with memory. Instead, they float through a city obsessed with youth, beauty and mortality. The shift changes the entire emotional temperature of the story.

The remake also embraces sentimentality in a way Wenders carefully avoids. The soaring score, the soft golden light and the naked emotional sincerity all push the film towards melodrama. Yet that's exactly why it works for so many viewers. It isn't trying to provoke philosophical reflection as much as emotional catharsis. The famous tragedy near the end would feel manipulative in "Wings of Desire", but in "City of Angels" it feels completely consistent with the film's belief that love and loss are inseparable.

What makes the remake interesting is that it doesn't diminish the original by being simpler. It merely aims at something different. Wenders asks whether eternal beings would envy humanity. "City of Angels" answers immediately: of course they would. Human life hurts, but the pain is preferable to endless detachment.

Viewed that way, the two films complement each other surprisingly well. One contemplates existence; the other embraces it.

Success Rate:  + 1.6

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Sister Street Fighter: Fifth Level Fist (3 Stars)

Despite its name, "Sister Street Fighter: Fifth Level Fist" isn't a sequel to the previous three films. Once more, Etsuko Shihomi is the leading actress, but she plays a different character.

It isn't a terrible martial arts film, but it constantly suffers from comparison with the original Sister Street Fighter trilogy. The earlier films thrived on raw energy, outrageous violence and the magnetic presence of Etsuko Shihomi, who brought real charisma and physical intensity to every fight scene. This spin-off feels thinner and more mechanical, as if it's copying the formula without understanding what made it exciting in the first place.

The biggest problem is that the film lacks the wild, slightly dangerous atmosphere that defined the trilogy. The action is competent, but rarely feels brutal or unpredictable. Instead of escalating into delirious exploitation excess, the film settles into routine genre beats. Even the villains feel anonymous compared with the grotesque monsters that populated the earlier entries.

There's also a sense that the series had already exhausted itself creatively. The original trilogy balanced martial arts spectacle with a strange comic-book insanity that made each film memorable, while "Fifth Level Fist" feels assembled from leftover ideas. It's watchable, occasionally entertaining and certainly energetic enough, but it never achieves the manic charm that made the trilogy stand out from the countless other 1970's martial arts knock-offs inspired by "Enter the Dragon". In one scene we even see an "Enter the Dragon" film poster on the wall, as if the director's yelling at the viewer "This is my inspiration". I'm sorry, it's just a weak imitation.

Return of the Sister Street Fighter (4 Stars)

Directed by Kazuhiko Yamaguchi, "Return of the Sister Street Fighter" is rougher, stranger and more entertaining than many of the better-known martial arts films of the 1970's. Etsuko Shihomi returns as Li Koryu with the same ferocious energy that made the earlier films memorable, but this sequel pushes the series further into comic-book absurdity. The villains are grotesque caricatures, the action scenes are gleefully excessive, and the film barely pauses to pretend that realism matters.

What makes the film work is Shihomi herself. Unlike many martial arts stars of the era, she projects both charm and genuine physical danger. She doesn't just pose between fight scenes; she moves with speed and conviction, making the chaotic choreography feel exciting rather than staged. The film also has a grimy exploitation atmosphere that separates it from the polished elegance of many "Enter the Dragon" imitators. It feels disreputable, loud and slightly unhinged, which is exactly its appeal.

The plot is nonsense, but that's beside the point. "Return of the Sister Street Fighter" succeeds because of its wild energy and Shihomi's magnetic screen presence. It's the kind of film that punches straight through good taste and becomes unforgettable because of it.

Off-Topic: Eurovision Song Contest 2026

Last night I watched the entire Eurovision Song Contest for the first time since... ever. I vaguely remember watching it when I lived with my parents, but I don't think I made it through the whole show. Since leaving home I've never watched it. Most years I've even boasted that I avoided listening to any of the songs, neither the English song, nor the German song, nor the winning song.

So why did I sit down to watch the show last night? I wanted to see if it's still as bad as everyone says. And yes, it really was bad. I picked a couple of songs that were my favourites, but all that meant was that they weren't quite as bad as the others. At the end of the evening I felt that I'd wasted four hours of my life. Or rather four and a half hours, because I watched a German after-show with interviews. I was fascinated by the wild eyes of the show's host, Barbara Schöneberger. Or maybe I was just too tired to get up and go to bed. I was almost at the end of my Samtrot Spätlese. I needed a bottle of wine to get me through four hours of terrible music.

Barbara interviewed the winners, the German entry and the main singer with the Austrian group.

Those are the official results. My personal favourite was Romania's song, which finished in third place. I wouldn't say it was the best song, I'd say it was the least bad song.

I finally flopped into bed about 2 am. When I woke up I opened the BBC news page, as I do every morning, and I read the headline "Bulgaria wins Eurovision and UK comes last". That's all anyone needed to know who hadn't watched the contest. Barely veiled disappointment that the UK did badly yet again. From what I've heard, the UK has done badly in the Eurovision Song Contest every year since 2003. That's a long time.

Then I checked the German news site Bild.de. Not because it's the best site, but because the better news sites charge money to read them. Wow! Total depression, even worse than the BBC. The editorial suggested that Germany should no longer participate in the ESC because "nobody appreciates our songs". Talk about sore losers.

But at least Bild made one comment that made me think. "The UK has given the world the best music for the last 65 years, so why are the UK's Eurovision songs so bad?" No examples were given, but it's obvious what was meant. The Beatles, Black Sabbath, punk rock, new wave, etc. Where has the magic gone from British music? Has the magic disappeared in a puff of smoke? Or do we live in a world where people only want to listen to "Bangaranga"?

Who am I?

Today I did something unusual. I asked ChatGPT the question, "Is dansator.blogspot.com a serious film blog?" That's a question I could have answered myself, but I want to know what others will be told if they ask the question. The reply was:

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Based on the available information, dansator.blogspot.com (Film Fan) appears to be a personal blog dedicated to a high volume of film consumption, rather than a mainstream industry news site.

• Content: The site features personal reviews, including detailed opinions on acclaimed films like Memento.

• Focus: The author indicates a high dedication to watching movies, stating they watch more than 400 films a year.

• Style: It operates as a personal diary/fan review format (Blogspot) rather than a commercial or professional journalism site. 

While it may not be a mainstream professional news outlet, it is "serious" in the sense that it is a dedicated, consistent, and long-term personal film review blog.

Looking at the content of the blog, I'd say it qualifies as a serious film blog, though in a very personal and niche way. It isn't professional journalism or academic criticism, but it clearly comes from someone with deep long-term engagement with cult cinema, genre films and film history.

What stands out is:

• a strong focus on cult and exploitation cinema

• enthusiasm for overlooked actresses and forgotten European genre films

• detailed historical interest rather than surface-level reactions

• a consistent personal voice across many years

It feels closer to old-school cinephile blogging than modern review sites. The writing is subjective and conversational, but there is genuine knowledge behind it. The blog also has the kind of obsessive continuity that usually marks a real film enthusiast rather than someone chasing clicks or SEO traffic.

At the same time, it doesn't really operate like formal criticism. The posts generally prioritise appreciation, rediscovery and personal response over theoretical analysis or rigorous argumentation. That's not necessarily a weakness; a lot of cult film writing works best when driven by enthusiasm and memory rather than academic distance.

So I'd describe it as:

• serious cinephile blogging: yes

• professional criticism: not really

• knowledgeable and authentic: definitely

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I agree with the judgement of my blog, though I find it strange that of all my reviews "Memento" was picked out.

I went on to ask further questions about the blog's author. This is where ChatGPT stumbled. It was suggested that "Mike Hood" could be a pseudonym, not my real name. Then it was stated that despite writing in English I'm a German, because of my detailed knowledge of German culture. That's curious. The final reply before I gave up, was:

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There doesn't seem to be much publicly available information about Mike Hood beyond what's visible on the blog itself. From the blog posts, he appears to be a long-running cult film enthusiast and blogger with a particular interest in European exploitation cinema, horror, sex comedies and obscure actresses from the 1960s and 1970s.

The blog doesn't present him as a professional critic, journalist, filmmaker or academic. Instead, he comes across as an independent cinephile writing out of personal enthusiasm. The style suggests someone who's been immersed in cult film culture for many years, especially the sort of film fandom that used to flourish on early internet forums and personal blogs.

One interesting detail is that the blog has existed for a long time and maintained a very consistent voice and focus. That usually points to someone genuinely dedicated to film history rather than someone building an online brand.

Beyond that, I couldn't verify much biographical information. "Mike Hood" is a very common name, so web searches mostly return unrelated people in business, music and other fields.

Return To Montauk (4 Stars)

"There are only two things that matter; there is the thing you did that you regret, the thing that cannot be undone; and there is the thing that you did not do, that you should have done, that you regret too, but it's too late now. It's easy to say that these things do not matter, because they're over, but they do. They are in fact all that matters. The things in between do not matter at all".

"Return to Montauk" is built around the terrible symmetry of regret. The quotation at the beginning doesn't just introduce the story; it becomes the film's entire emotional architecture. Everything Max does in Montauk is haunted by the two kinds of failure the quote describes: the love he lost through cowardice and compromise, and the life he built afterwards that can never quite compensate for it.

What makes the film so affecting is that it refuses to offer easy redemption. Max returns hoping that memory can somehow be corrected, as if revisiting Rebecca might undo decades of emotional damage. But the film understands that regret doesn't disappear simply because people finally say the things they should've said years earlier. Time itself becomes the enemy. The tenderness between Max and Rebecca is real, but so is the knowledge that they are no longer the people who once had the chance to make different choices.

Director Volker Schlondorff keeps the film quiet and restrained, avoiding melodrama in favour of melancholy observation. Stellan Skarsgard gives Max a weary sadness that feels painfully authentic; he isn't simply mourning a lost woman, but an entire unrealised version of himself.

In the end, the opening quote proves brutally accurate. The ordinary years in between fade into the background. What remains are the moments that shaped a life forever; the choices made, and the choices avoided. "Return to Montauk" suggests that people never really escape those moments. They carry them silently, until memory itself becomes a kind of final reckoning.

Geh, zieh dein Dirndl aus (4 Stars)

Released at the height of the Bavarian sex-comedy boom, "Geh zieh dein Dirndl aus" (i.e. "Take off your dirndl") is exactly the kind of film that critics usually dismiss with a shrug and audiences secretly remember with affection. It's broad, cheeky and utterly unconcerned with subtlety, yet beneath all the innuendo and slapstick chaos there's a fascinating snapshot of a particular moment in West German popular cinema. The film belongs to that strange early-1970's period when Lederhosen comedies became enormously profitable by mixing postcard Bavaria, sexual liberation and old-fashioned farce into one commercially irresistible package.

What makes the film especially interesting today is the presence of Dorothea Rau. She was never promoted internationally on the level of stars like Uschi Glas or Ingrid Steeger, but within the Lederhosen cycle she became one of its defining faces. Rau had an unusual screen presence for these productions. Many actresses in the genre were presented almost entirely as decorative fantasy figures; Dorothea Rau, by contrast, often projected intelligence, confidence and a slightly mischievous sense of self-awareness. She understood the joke the films were making and seemed to enjoy playing along with it.

In "Geh zieh dein Dirndl aus", that quality becomes essential. The film itself is assembled from the usual ingredients; misunderstandings, frustrated husbands, sexually adventurous tourists and endless opportunities for clothing to be removed at strategically comic moments. But Rau gives the material a spark that elevates it beyond mechanical sex farce. She moves through the absurd situations with complete confidence, never looking embarrassed or trapped by the material. Instead, she turns the film's exaggerated sexuality into part of the comedy itself.

Her importance to the Lederhosen comedies wasn't simply that she appeared in them; plenty of actresses did. What distinguished Rau was that she helped define the tone of the genre during its commercial peak. These films depended on balancing eroticism with friendliness. If they became too vulgar, audiences recoiled; if they became too innocent, audiences lost interest. Rau occupied that middle ground perfectly. She brought glamour and sensuality, but also warmth and humour. That balance helped make the films feel playful rather than aggressive.

Watching the film now, it's also striking how strongly the Lederhosen cycle reflected changing attitudes in West Germany after the social upheavals of the late 1960's. The films pretended to celebrate rustic tradition, yet they were really about modern permissiveness invading conservative environments. Dirndls, beer halls and Alpine villages became colourful packaging for stories about sexual freedom. In that sense, performers like Dorothea Rau were central to the genre's success because they embodied the contradiction. She looked perfectly at home within the traditional Bavarian imagery while simultaneously representing the more liberated attitudes the films were selling.

Artistically, "Geh zieh dein Dirndl aus" won't convert anyone who already hates the Lederhosen comedies. The jokes are repetitive, the plotting barely matters and the filmmaking is functional at best. Yet the film survives as an entertaining cultural artefact and as a reminder of how important performers can be within supposedly disposable cinema. Dorothea Rau may never have become a major international star, but within this uniquely German subgenre she was one of its defining personalities; charming, playful and absolutely essential to its appeal.

I was excited to find out that Dorothea Rau grew up in Münchingen, the village where I live, in a small house next to the cemetery. The address is Kontaler Straße 18. People who remember her think of her as a scandalous porn star. They don't get it. There was never any real sex in the Bavarian sex comedies or in any of the German erotic films of the 1970's. People were fast to judge things that they knew nothing about.