Sex Murder Art

"Left for Good. Took the corpse." Jörg Buttgereit has a reputation as one of the most original, innovative and dangerous of filmmakers, banned -- and bootlegged -- the world over. His work, notably Nekromantik, Nekromantik 2, Der Todesking, and Schramm, traverses horror and art-house genres with a dry wit, dealing explicitly with themes of sex and death. He is perhaps the first and only true DIY filmmaker superstar, having been championed by a worldwide post-"video nasties" horror zine community. John Waters bestowed upon him the accolade that he had directed the first erotic film for necrophiles. Originally published in 1994, Sex Murder Art is the definitive account of the director's work, filled with contemporaneous interviews and framed around the author's visit to Berlin for the filming of Schramm. Unknown at the time, this ambitious psychedelic serial killer feature would prove Buttgereit's last; at the age of thirty he effectively retired from making movies. Revised and expanded, this new edition looks at the volatile era in which Buttgereit emerged, and the youth culture of a Berlin divided by the Wall. It questions how and why a no-budget filmmaker, once outlawed on the pretext that he glorified violence, can still hold sway as a cause célèbre. In the 2020s, the author returns to a very different Berlin for a new series of interviews, considers his own place in this changed world, and meets a fresh legion of Buttgereit fans while on a road trip to promote German Angst, an anthology movie of which Buttgereit is part. Detailed analysis of Buttgereit's feature films, plus the director's early short film work, complement this comprehensive and illuminating study. Sex Murder Art remains the ultimate testament to the obsession, paranoia and politics of underground filmmaking.