What was unusual about Dora Ratjen who came fourth in the women’s high jump at the 1936 Berlin Olympics?
c-d:
1. Franz Biberkopf’s Theme [Berlin Alexanderplatz]
2. Maria’s Theme and Waltz (The Marriage of Maria Braun)
3. Frankfurt Overture (Mother Kuster’s Trip to Heaven)
4. Maria’s Help (The Niklashausen Journey)
5. Temptation (The Stationmaster’s Wife)
6. Serenade for Franz (Fox and His…
Episode 1: Psychological Aspects
Episode 2: Women in Art
Notes by Nick Currie (Momus)
Ways of Seeing was a BBC television series consisting of visual essays that raise questions about hidden ideologies in visual images. The series gave rise to a later book of the same name written by John Berger.
It would be easy to say that Ways of Seeing is hopelessly dated — made in 1972, the films come across as a puritan-groovy mix of Monty Python, the Open University and the Look Around You spoofs. And yet what’s so remarkable about this series is that it seems more apposite, subversive and thought-provoking than ever. The Britain we glimpse in the films, already alienated by spooky BBC Radiophonic Workshop music by Delia Derbyshire, is alienated even more by the passing of time. Alienated usefully, in the Brechtian sense; we look at a capitalist society which is like, and unlike, our own.
