World on a Wire Film Still

World on a Wire

Rainer Werner Fassbinder

 
World on a Wire (Criterion Blu-Ray)

21 Feb 2012

Blu-Ray

1 Disc

SRP: $39.95

Criterion Store price:$31.96

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  • Germany
  • 1973
  • 212 minutes
  • Color
  • 1.33:1
  • German
  •  
  • Spine #598

SYNOPSIS: World on a Wire is a gloriously paranoid, boundlessly inventive take on the future from German wunderkind Rainer Werner Fassbinder. With dashes of Stanley Kubrick, Kurt Vonnegut, and Philip K. Dick, Fassbinder tells the noir-spiked tale of reluctant hero Fred Stiller (Klaus Löwitsch), a cybernetics engineer who uncovers a massive corporate conspiracy. At risk? (Virtual) reality as we know it. Originally made for German television, this recently rediscovered, three-and-a-half-hour labyrinth is a satiric and surreal look at the world of tomorrow from one of cinema’s kinkiest geniuses.

Cast & CreditsOpen

Cast

Fred StillerKlaus Löwitsch
Eva Vollmer Mascha Rabben
Herbert SiskinsKarl-Heinz Vosgerau
Professor Henry VollmerAdrian Hoven
Günther LauseIvan Desny
Gloria FrommBarbara Valentin
Fritz WalfangGünther Lamprecht
Maya Schmidt-GentnerMargit Carstensen
Franz HahnWolfgang Schenck
Hans EdelkernJoachim Hansen
HartmannRudolf Lenz
Mark HolmKurt Raab
Detective StuhlfauthKarl Scheydt
Inspector LehnerRainer Hauer
RuppUlli Lommel
Von Weinlaub Heinz Meier
UschiIngrid Caven
Man in carEddie Constantine
Waiter at partyRainer Langhans

Credits

Disc Features

  • New, restored digital transfer, supervised by cinematographer Michael Ballhaus, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition
  • Fassbinder’s “World on a Wire”: Looking Ahead to Today, a fifty-minute documentary about the making of the film by Juliane Lorenz
  • New interview with German-film scholar Gerd Gemünden
  • New English subtitles
  • Trailer for the 2010 theatrical release
  • PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film critic Ed Halter

From the CurrentView the Current »

Film Essays

World on a Wire: The Hall of Mirrors

By Ed HalterFebruary 21, 2012

Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s only work of science fiction, World on a Wire (1973) is surely one of the most obscure items among the forty-odd titles that constitute his filmography.


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Other Editions

World on a Wire (Criterion DVD)

21 Feb 2012

DVD

2 Discs

SRP: $29.95

Criterion Store price:$23.96

+ Add to Cart