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Loading ...Ban lifted on gay cannibal film
05.29.2009 5:00pm EDT
(Berlin) A German federal court has overturned a ban on a movie inspired by the case of a confessed cannibal, ruling that the artistic freedom of the filmmakers trumped the cannibal’s personal rights.
Screenings of the movie “Rohtenburg” were banned in March 2006 - just before it was due to open in German theaters – after a lower court ruled that the film infringed the personal rights of Armin Meiwes.Meiwes is serving a life sentence for murdering and eating Bernd Juergen Brandes in 2001. Meiwes was convicted of manslaughter in 2004 and sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in prison after the jury found Brandes had been a willing victim.
Prosecutors appealed the conviction, arguing the court should have found Meiwes guilty of murder. In 2006 at his second trial Meiwes was convicted of murder and sentenced to life.
Meiwes and Brandes met through an internet bulletin board for gay men interested in a cannibalism fetish.
“If you are between 18 and 25 years old you are my boy. Come to me and I eat your horny flesh” his ad said.
The case came to light when Meiwes posted more ads after Meiwes death for additional victims, and readers of the postings contacted police.
When police searched Meiwes’ home they discovered neatly wrapped body parts in plastic bags which were labeled “according to cuts.” Bones and other “non edibles” were found buried in the garden. Meiwes told police he already had consumed about 40 pounds of Brandes’s body.
He told police that the two men had enjoyed a final meal together. Brandes had agreed to be castrated and the two sautéed his penis and testicles. They washed down the meal with a German white wine.
Testifying in his own defense Meiwes said that he hoped Brandes, 43, would “die all by himself” from having his penis cut off.
Meiwes, who was been dubbed the “Cannibal of Kassel” after the town where he lived, told the court that he had prayed for God’s forgiveness for both himself and for Brandes just before he severed the man’s throat.
The case both fascinated and appalled Germany, leading to the film “Rohtenburg,” directed by Martin Weisz and starring Thomas Kretschmann as a cannibal named Oliver Hartwin.
When it was banned from theaters, Weisz went to court arguing that Meiwes’ case did no more than provide inspiration for the movie.
Germany’s Federal Court of Justice ruled this week that the producers’ right to artistic freedom outweighed Meiwes’ personal rights, adding there was “a public interest in information” on the case.
The film did not misrepresent the facts of the case, which were in any case widely known, the court statement said.
But despite the ruling it is not clear whether the movie will now be screened in German theaters.
sounds tasty!
Neil,
or the one about the temperature in John Wayne Gacy’s house being 32 below
I’ve waiting all my life for my very own German cannibal, ha!
I hate to say this buuut: only the Germans! Sheeesh!
I actually downloaded the American version, Grimm Love, yesterday and was a bit surprised because it plays out like a dissonant romantic film. Not a bad film at all, but then again I’ve always been quirky.
First, recall that the reason Meiwes wasn’t initially tried for murder was that there was ample documentation of the “victim’s” consent, both in writing and on video. The victim was a software engineer or something, worked for Siemens (I think) in Berlin. He entered into the sequence of actions of his own will. Also, Germany didn’t have a law against cannibalism at the time of the first trial.
Cannibalism occupies a strange little corner of German culture. During the economic turmoil during and after WW1, there were numerous cases of cannibalism. One involved a neighborhood where–during chronic food shortages–there was someone selling potted meat. It wasn’t from your standard livestock. This was before TV, before internet, before most people had radios.
Strange to consider, but imagine that this case was in the US? I can think of at least a few states where the only way to prosecute might be with assisting a suicide, followed up with abuse of a corpse.
Anybody know if Germany has a Federal law similar to the “Son of Sam” law here (where criminals can’t profit from media depictions of their actions)? Did Meiwes see any revenue from this movie? Would he have standing to sue over it?
I agree that the film should not be banned. It is very disturbing but there are many stories that are disturbing. How many childrens stories involve cannibalism, (Hansel and Gretel for example, not to mention others)? It’s a primal fear that all animals have, and it taps into that, forcing us to confront that fear. That’s one function that art plays in society, and it’s an important one.
This film was at the G&L film festival under the title Grimm Love. Kerri Russell is in it and frankly it’s creepily romantic.
We find people we have things in common with all the time. Imagine feeling so alone in your adult urges and meeting that perfect someone that has the same urge. You want to eat a human and they want to be eaten. It’s very intimate and very… sort of dreamily romantic in a very disturbing way. It took something of gore and grossness and sort of made it lovey and filled with depth.
It’s not nearly as gory as one would think. The best scenes are when they first meet and neither of them is sure the other is for real. Their wanting and the comfort which they reach once they realize how lucky they are to have met each other… it’s really breath taking.
Two consenting adults can’t be wrong… imagine someone loving you so much they want to digest you?? I dunno. Seems like gay marriage would just be easier though.
Somehow, I don’t know, maybe I am old-fashioned, but I prefer romance and love, the triumph of good over evil, where love wins out and people kept apart somehow find each other again against incredible odds, uplifting sort of things.
I got through a film like about Nazi camp Sobibor in Poland where half of the 600 camp inmates eventually managed to escape into the nearby woods while the other half were gunned down as they ran against incredible odds of plans going wrong, …even though the Nazis were brutal and horrid gassing people, doing ugly and worthless medical experiments on them and cremating them in ovens, sending human hair to be woven into car seat fabric by a German automaker at that time, I don’t recall stories of them eating human flesh for dinner, really loving it and getting sexually turned by it all. Meiwes takes horror to a new level. It was enough for me to see scenes of a gay man being slowly strangled by the Nazis with a piano wire around his neck to force him to divulge names and addresses of other gay men around he knew. I have gotten through plenty of killing, savagery, blood in various films. a film about the massacre of Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda, and a hotel owner and his family’s efforts to survive plus have his hotel turn into a refuge and a haven for terrified people at risk of him and his family and everyone being killed, and in the end countless refugees including the hotel owner waiting for countries to take them without this Meiwes.
My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Mrs. Doubtfire, In and Out, Trick, The Birdcage, Brokeback Mountain, The Wedding Banquet (another Ang Lee film), Under One Roof, Seven Years In Tibet, The Zohan, Big Daddy starring Adam Sandler, much more my speed.
Jessi! Thank you. It took me just a moment, but I haven’t laughed that hard for some time.
The story was disgusting. The movie would be, at best, disturbing. But your comment was exactly what I needed right now. Thank you.
It reminds me of the add I heard about for Jeffrey Dahlmer’s (sp?) old apartment which read:
Apartment for rent. Roommates included*.
*Some assembly required
Neil
did ya hear about the cannibal who passed his brother in the woods?
Umm…very disturbing, but I agree with creative freedom. Everybody should be able to express themselves in whichever way they see fit. This isn’t a movie I would want to see, but it sounds interesting.
Adolf Hitler would love to see the movie if he was still alive.