New German Cinema: Images of a Generation

“New German Cinema: The Images of a Generation” explores the context from which the films made by Fassbinder, Wenders, Herzog, von Trotta and others emerged during the late 1960s through to the mid-1980s. It examines the American dominance of the German market place, the development of a film subsidy system, the notion and politics of an Autorenkino, the framework of European art cinema, and distribution and exhibition initiatives that helped facilitate the birth of and shape a new national cinema. The author discusses the way in which the New German Cinema films engaged with contemporary West German reality and how the films can be read as raising important questions about West Germany’s self understanding in the postwar era. Although the new cinema was internationally acclaimed, critics were virtually unanimous in declaring its demise in the early 1980s and this study concludes with a consideration of a number of factors that contributed to such a perception.