The American Soldier

1970 [GERMAN]

Action / Drama

5
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Rotten 55% · 14 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Spilled 55% · 250 ratings
IMDb Rating 6.5/10 10 2051 2.1K

Plot summary

Ricky returns to Munich from Vietnam and is promptly hired as a contract killer.

Director

Rainer Werner Fassbinder Photo
Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Top cast

Irm Hermann Photo
Irm Hermann as Hure
Kurt Raab Photo
Kurt Raab as Rickys Bruder
Rainer Werner Fassbinder Photo
Rainer Werner Fassbinder as Franz Walsch
Karl Scheydt Photo
Karl Scheydt as Ricky
720p.BluRay 1080p.BluRay
736.5 MB
986*720
German 2.0
NR
Subtitles fr  
23.976 fps
1 hr 20 min
Seeds 2
1.34 GB
1480*1080
German 2.0
NR
Subtitles fr  
23.976 fps
1 hr 20 min
Seeds 7

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by valis1949 6 / 10

They're Coming To Take Me Away, Ha Haa!

American SOLDIER is certainly not among Fassbinder's greatest works. Fassbinder's oeuvre demands that his actors 'pose' rather than 'act'. Ordinarily, a successful dramatic performance allows the viewer to forget that an actor is 'pretending', but that one is witnessing a real depiction of emotions and reactions. However, Fassbinder strives for the converse of this process. He seems to aim for an almost militant lack of affectation, and his actors strike stylized poses which only represent authentic emotions. It's almost like German Kabuki Theater. It would seem that this form of acting technique would lend itself very well to the genre of Gangster Noir, but this film definitely missed the mark. The tale of three rogue police detectives who employ the skills of a heartless American Vietnam veteran is bogged down in an untidy avalanche of wacky details. Odd monologues, pointless car trips, enigmatic phone calls, and arguably the weirdest final scene ever brought to film, do not advance the storyline, but only confuse and perplex the viewer. Fassbinder's more successful films created surreal hyper-realities, but American SOLDIER only conveyed a feeling of disconnected opaqueness. Only for Die Hard Fassbinder Fans.
Reviewed by zetes 7 / 10

For fans only

Not one of Fassbinder's best, but certainly worth a look for those interested in the man's work. In mood and style, it's reminiscent of Godard's Alphaville, and my reactions to both films are similar: I am intrigued, but a bit bored. And I don't think either succeed in the end. The American Soldier concerns a haughty German-American soldier, fresh from Vietnam, who struts around killing people for reasons which are kept mostly obscure (he's some kind of gangster or hitman). The police are after him, though the police seem just as wicked. I didn't care much about what was going on – no compelling reason was ever given for me to care. However, many elements of the film impressed me. Fassbinder's idiosyncratic sense of pace and mood pervades. The performances are pretty good. Fassbinder himself appears in a small role and, as usual, he delivers a remarkable performance. He has to be the best actor/director of all time. Peer Raben never seems to write a lot of music for Fassbinder's films. Instead, he just writes one theme that is used several times throughout the given picture. They are always exceptional, and his theme (and also theme song, which is the same tune with lyrics added) is excellent here. And then there's this ending. Fassbinder has a talent for unique and notable endings, and the end of this film is one of the weirdest and most remarkable I've ever seen. 7/10.
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