Gather round, young ones, and let me tell you about a mysterious bygone era known as the eighties. This was before all your newfangled internet and AI chatbots.
Movies were a trip back then. If you missed them when they played in the theater, you had to wait and hope they showed up at your local VHS rental store, or perhaps at some late night presentation at a college theater.
But some movies were like the arc of the covenant. Their existence was rumored, but they were almost impossible to track down. This was especially true with horror films or movies with graphic violence. A friend showed me a copy of “I Spit on Your Grave” in his bedroom around 1989. I think I finally saw the famed “Faces of Death” at a wacky theater on Hollywood boulevard around 1991. (I also saw the great “Peeping Tom”—banned in Britain when it first came out—at the same theater. Oh, I also saw “Rabid Grannies” there. That was a great venue.)
Was “Angst” one of these films? To be honest, I’m not sure I heard of it until recently. But it seems like it fits in that oeuvre of films known for transgressive sadism. Its wiki page notes, “It was banned in many European countries on its release for its depictions of violence.”
Anyway, I finally saw it. Like a lot of these things, it feels a bit tame now that we live in a world where video games allow characters to yank out their enemy’s spines. The narrative follows a serial killer who gets released from prison and almost immediately goes on a killing spree. (That parole board really needs to update their protocols.) He’s a scrawny, mousy weirdo, e.g. the stereotype of a crazed killer since Norman Bates. Eventually he ends up at a house where he dispatches members of a family, though he—to my eternal appreciation—keeps the dog alive. And things kind of go from there.
Oh, did I mention the film is Austrian? That gives it some added gravitas.
If anything, it reminded me of the film that put Micheal Rooker on the map: “Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer.” Both movies have this grime on them that makes you want to take a shower after viewing. It’s not necessarily the violence … it’s the utter brokenness of the lead character. You don’t really hate them, but you also can’t find any sympathy for them. In some disturbing way, in both films, you start to inhabit their minds and their world.
“Angst” also has a nice cold war concrete vibe. The Austrian landscape is totally brutalist and unforgiving.
All in all, a weird film, maybe more interesting as a curiosity, but worth checking out for those inclined.
My related reviews
- Madhouse (Asylum horror)
- Compulsion (Vintage thriller)
More on “Companion”
Like horror? Check out my slasher novel The Mirror Man – available now on Amazon. Kindle Unlimited subscribers read for free.
