Udo Kier

A woman swaps bodies with a chair, and everyone likes her better as a chair.

Albert Oehlen steps behind the camera to present a portrait of himself, in life and at work, albeit substituted by actor and similarly brazen iconoclast Udo Kier, with musician Kim Gordon as his inner self, interviewer and judge.

In Brazil in 1977, Marcelo, a technology specialist fleeing a mysterious past, returns to Recife in search of peace, but realizes the city is far from the refuge he seeks.

Haunted by a malevolent spirit since childhood, a desperate mother allows herself to become possessed in order to save the life of her terminally ill daughter.

Udo Kier was a demon, Frankenstein, murderer, lover and six times Adolf Hitler. He has starred in art films, indie classics and blockbusters. Cult directors, superstars and audiences worldwide have fallen for the Cologne native's aura and have given him an incredible career - in Europe and in Hollywood. Now the atypical international star turns 80.

Architect R.M. Schindler, transformed the way we see space and laid the foundation for what is now considered the California lifestyle of indoor-outdoor living. His life story (1887-1953) unfolds in parallel with that of Modern Architecture. The film follows Schindler's journey from Vienna through Chicago to Southern California, observing where possible through the lens of his own camera or listening to his own words. The story is told through narration, interviews, Schindler's theoretical writings, correspondence, photos and renderings of his many works and projects.

Anna is 60 and her acting heyday is now behind her. She lives on her own but has a friend and confidant in her downstairs neighbour Michel, who is also single. Reluctantly, Anna accepts a job as a language coach for 17-year-old Adrian who has a speech impediment and is something of a misfit. She recognises him as the boy who recently snatched her handbag in the street.

Women and their children disappeared without a trace in a mountain near Rome. The case remains unsolved and therefore becomes a myth and the film sets out to discover what this and a myth actually is, namely an expression of past history in time and space. We see like in a very old play the appearance of the actors playing the myth, who become more and more intensely mythical themselves. They speak up and yet suffer, they are just playing and yet they are guilty. The narrator, the choir, the revenge, the madness, the love, the death. This is what Blue is made of!

Udo Kier dies his way through film history. He screams, falls, lies, is cut into pieces, shot or commits suicide. Again and again his empty gaze, again and again his rigid body. In 54 years as an actor, Udo Kier played in more than 170 feature films, 120 series episodes and 50 short films. More than 70 times Udo Kier tried to give an expression to dying and death. In Staging Death, these representations of death merge into a montage of the most diverse shots, film formats, special effects and sound designs. "Directors are now thinking increasingly strained about what new ways they can kill me. […] At some point, somebody would have to make a montage of all my film deaths." Udo Kier (Interview Subway Magazine #145, December 1999)

South America, 1960. A lonely and grumpy Holocaust survivor convinces himself that his new neighbor is none other than Adolf Hitler. Not being taken seriously, he starts an independent investigation to prove his claim, but when the evidence still appears to be inconclusive, Polsky is forced to engage in a relationship with the enemy in order to obtain irrefutable proof.