The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)
Die Angst des Tormanns beim Elfmeter (1972)
A Film by Wim Wenders
DVD5 (Custom) | VIDEO_TS | NTSC 4:3 (720x480) | 01:40:28 | 4,06 Gb
Audio: German AC3 2.0 @ 224 Kbps | Subs: Japanese, Chinese, English (added), Spanish (added)
Genre: Drama | West Germany, Austria
A Film by Wim Wenders
DVD5 (Custom) | VIDEO_TS | NTSC 4:3 (720x480) | 01:40:28 | 4,06 Gb
Audio: German AC3 2.0 @ 224 Kbps | Subs: Japanese, Chinese, English (added), Spanish (added)
Genre: Drama | West Germany, Austria
A loose adaptation of a novelette by author Peter Handke, this early effort from acclaimed director Wim Wenders follows penalized goalie Joseph Bloch (Arthur Brauss) as he makes his way through the city after missing penalty kick and getting suspended from a game. Wandering by a local cinema, Joseph picks up the pretty cashier and the two spend the night together. Inexplicably strangling the girl in the light of the morning, the seemingly unaffected Joseph makes his way through the city streets as emotion begins to boil under the surface of his stony gaze. Making his way to an old girlfriends house in the country, the emotionally shattered goalie has little to do but wait for the police to close in on him.
IMDB
DVD Distributor: Cinefil Imagica
The Goalkeeper's Fear of the Penalty outdoes even Wenders' subsequent Alice in the Cities in its sense that everything shown is at once subjective and objective. German goalie Bloch (Brauss) walks out of a game in Vienna, hangs around, commits an arbitrary murder, and then takes a coach to the Austrian border to look up an old flame. It's the journey of a man who's getting too old for his job, living off his nerves, sustained by his taste for Americana, movies and rock (everything from Hitchcock to 'Wimaway'). Brauss' engagingly hangdog face anchors it all in recognisable human feelings, while avoiding the least hint of 'psychological' explanation. More than in his later movies, Wenders' style here has a remarkably charged quality: every frame haunts you for goddam weeks.
The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)
This film is a unique experience. Alternately strange, boring, and fascinating, it's the story of a professional German football goalie who simply walks off the playing field one day and proceeds to roam the city idly, stopping to pick up newspapers (to check the scores), watch movies, loiter around, and commit the random murder of a ticket-girl at the cinema he frequents. This is the first half of the film. The second half of the film is a journey to the country to attempt to reconcile things with an old girlfriend. Wenders' film is in a class by itself.
The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)
Based on the novel "Die Angst des Tormannes beim Elfmeter" by Austrian existentialist writer, Peter Handke, The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick is a powerful and unnerving film by the great German director Wim Wenders (Wings of Desire, Paris, Texas). As the film opens, the goalie, Joseph Bloch, (Arthur Brauss) is suspended from a soccer game in Vienna for missing a penalty kick. Seemingly not upset, he goes into town, then commits an unplanned and seemingly unmotivated murder of a cinema cashier.
The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)
![The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)]()
Presenting us with a world that does not fit our picture of what constitutes rational behavior, Wenders refuses to explain the goalie's senseless action. Bloch simply continues his life in a matter-of-fact way, although a great deal of emotion seems to be churning under the surface. He retreats to a country inn to find his old girl friend. Nothing much happens. He goes to the movies, converses with the local residents, drinks a lot, gets into a fight, and ostensibly waits for the police to close in. His expression remains the same no matter what he is doing. As stated by Adam Groves in his review in The Cutting Edge, "He may be a homicidal sociopath, but Joseph seems to fit in quite well with the world around him, which seems to be the whole point".
The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)
![The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)]()
Bloch talks about his life as a goalie throughout the film. At the end, he wanders into to a local soccer game and explains to a visiting salesman the thoughts that go through a goalie's mind during a penalty kick, for example, how the goalie must outguess the shooter. Perhaps dramatizing the dehumanizing effects of modern society, Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick is a strange, intriguing, and complex film that definitely deserves repeated viewing to unlock the puzzle. A possible hint involves a repetitive theme of a lost boy who drowned because he couldn't communicate.IMDB Review
The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)
The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972)
Special Feature: Filmography only
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