FASSBINDER’S EFFI BRIEST IS QUITE LITERALLY A FILM OF THEODOR FONTANTE’S NOVEL: EVERYTHING ABOUT THE WAY IT’S CONCEIVED AND STRUCTURED DRAWS ATTENTION BACK TO THE LITERARY SOURCE. AS A RESULT, EFFI IS NOT JUST ANOTHER FASSBINDER VICTIM-FIGURE, BUT (TRUE TO FONTANE) AN INDEX OF HER SOCIETY’S MORALITY.
Set in late 19th century Germany, an inexperienced teenage girl is pushed into a marriage with a minor aristocrat, Baron von Instetten, who is many years older than her. She moves to a house she thinks is haunted in a small isolated Baltic town, and bears him a child, but her first knowledge of emotional warmth is gained when a neighbour makes moves to seduce her. She is exploited in various ways by everyone around her, but she suffers only because she hasn’t the strength to challenge the social codes that bind her. Hanna Schygulla plays her with absolute conviction. Filmed with extraordinary delicacy and reserve in black and white, this could easily be one of Fassbinder’s best films.