No Mercy, No Future
{{Infobox film
| name = No Mercy, No Future
| image = NoMercyNoFuturePoster.jpg
| caption = Theatrical release poster
| director = Helma Sanders-Brahms
| producer = Helma Sanders-Brahms
| writer = Helma Sanders-Brahms
| music = Manfred Opitz
Harald Grosskopf
| cinematography = Thomas Mauch
| editing = Ursula West
Hanni Lawerenz
Bettina Böhler
| studio = Helma Sanders-Brahms Filmproduktion GmbH
| distributor = Basis-Film-Verleih GmbH
| released = {{Film date|1981|11|01|Hof International Film Festival|df=y}}
| runtime = 108 minutes
| country = West Germany
| language =German
}}
No Mercy, No Future ({{langx|de|Die Berührte }}, "The Touched") is a 1981 West German drama film directed by Helma Sanders-Brahms.
Plot
Veronika Christoph, the troubled daughter of uncaring bourgeois parents, has been institutionalized due to her schizophrenia. Without proper psychiatric treatment for her unearthly visions, she prowls the streets along the Berlin Wall at night in search of God, yet settles for the company of strange, exiled men.
Cast
- Elisabeth Stepanek as Veronika Christoph
- Jorge Reis as Demba
- Curt Curtini as Magician
- Hasan Hasan as Monsef
- Carola Regnier as Physician
- Hubertus von Weyrauch as Veronika's Father
- Irmgard Mellinger as Veronika's Mother
- Nguyen Chi Danh as Patient
- Erich Koltschack as Old Man
- George Stamkoski as Greek Man
- Karl Heinz Reimann as God's Son
- Abdel Wahed Askar as Ibrahim
- Nabil Reiroumi as Salem
- Harald Hoedt as Patient
- Erika Dannhoff as Countess
- Günther Ehlert as Death
Release
Reception
Thomas Elsaesser, author of European Cinema: Face to Face with Hollywood, wrote that No Mercy, No Future was a "relative" failure in the commercial and critical aspects compared to Germany, Pale Mother and that the situation "may have led Sanders-Brahms in the direction of the European art cinema."Elsaesser, Thomas. European Cinema: Face to Face with Hollywood. Amsterdam University Press, 2005. {{ISBN|9053565949}}, 9789053565940. p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=u5Q5xi-KsLcC&pg=PA223 223]. London's Time Out has referred to the film's performances as faultless{{cite magazine|url=http://www.timeout.com/london/film/no-mercy-no-future|title=No Mercy, No Future|magazine=Time Out London|accessdate=31 December 2013}} and it was screened at the 1982 Berlin International Film Festival{{cite magazine|url=http://www.americancinemapapers.com/files/BERLIN_1982.htm|title=Berlin 1982 – The 32nd Berlinale Filmfestspiele Assignment in Berlin|last=Kennedy|first=Harlan|date=May–June 1982|magazine=Film Comment|accessdate=31 December 2013}} and won the British Film Institute's Sutherland Trophy Award for 1981. Critic Michael Atkinson praised the film as a "classic, show-it-all acting coup that doesn’t wriggle free of your memory very easily."{{cite web|url=http://www.ifc.com/fix/2008/11/billy-the-kid-no-mercy-no-futu|title=Billy the Kid, No Mercy, No Future|last=Atkinson|first=Michael|date=4 November 2008|website=IFC Center, AMC Networks|accessdate=31 December 2013}}
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- {{IMDb title|0082060}}
- {{Rotten Tomatoes|id=no_mercy_no_future|title=No Mercy, No Future}}
- [https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/484695/die-beruhrte No Mercy, No Future] at the TCM Movie Database
- [http://www.filmportal.de/film/die-beruehrte_c4c82f790bc7483f860c2db901f06494 Die Berührte] at Film Portal {{in lang|de}}
{{Helma Sanders-Brahms}}
{{Sutherland Trophy}}
Category:1980s avant-garde and experimental films
Category:Fiction about schizophrenia
Category:Films directed by Helma Sanders-Brahms
Category:Films set in psychiatric hospitals
Category:German avant-garde and experimental films
Category:German independent films