DECODER (1984) Blu-ray/DVD Combo
Director: Muscha
Vinegar Syndrome

Vinegar Syndrome brings the German punk sci-fi thriller DECODER, "where Muzak is more than music" to Blu-ray DVD combo.

In a futuristic Hamburg, F.M. (FM Einheit) spends his days endeavoring to create music electronically while his girlfriend Christiana (Christiane Felscherinow, the subject of CHRISTIANE F.) works in a peepshow by day and raises death frogs by night. While experimenting with tone generators, F.M. witnesses erratic behavior in passersby on the street and starts to wonder if sound waves can be used to control human beings. He carries out further experiments with his tape recorder playing industrial sounds and observes the customers of fast food chain H. Burger. When a group of punks storm the restaurant and terrorize the customers, F.M. discovers that his theory is indeed true and is being deployed by the management who switch from Muzak to industrial musique concrete to drive them (and F.M. himself) away. His girlfriend either does not believe him or fears for what will happen should he pursue. When he stumbles upon a cult of punk revolutionaries whose leader (Genesis P-Orridge) stress the importance of wielding information as a weapon, he arms them with the equipment to foment anarchy and revolution. Little does F.M. realize that he is under observation from Jaeger (Bill Rice, VORTEX) who makes dissidents disappear on behalf of big business interests to make F.M. disappear; however, Jaeger has become obsessed with Christiana and is having second thoughts about the nature of his work.

An underground film with a slick German New Wave aesthetic, DECODER utilizes footage shot by the filmmakers and featuring some of the actors in the 1982 Berlin riots that sprung up during Ronald Reagan's visit to the city. Its view of a dystopic Germany of cold Eastern Bloc office buildings and derelict, graffiti-covered buildings in which alienated individuals, couples, and revolutionary communes squat wary of eviction, persecution, and murder by a totalitarian government while productive members of society as represented here by the clean and healthy junior trainees of H. Burger are likened to the new Hitler Youth reflects the anxieties of the era. On the other hand, the story may also have parallels with the punk war against the mainstream music scene (Einheit, director Muscha, and Genesis P-Orridge were all musicians in the German and British punk scene along with the film's writer Trini Trimpop), as the sort of music that causes noncompliant behavior is defined as "illegal sound waves" that disrupt the smooth running of business as a challenge to what is defined for the masses as music (Christiana says of his electronic fiddlings that F.M. does not know anything about music as in the proper sense). Although short, the film does meander, with its best uneventful moments carried along by the eighties synthpop coolness of Soft Cell's song "Seedy Films" while clips from Fritz Lang's METROPOLIS seem less appropriate than DR. MABUSE, but they may actually foreshadow the fate of one of the characters more so than the vague feelings of dread Christiana has from dreams she cannot recall. NAKED LUNCH author William S. Burroughs makes a brief appearance shot in London, his book "The Electronic Revolution" having been a major influence on the film. One of the film's few professional actors was Ralf Richter, brother of Einheit, who had already appeared in DAS BOOT and would go onto a prolific career in German film and television.

Previously released stateside on a DVD/CD set featuring a PAL-converted transfer and some nice extras, including the score tracks but sadly not the Soft Cell track, DECODER comes to Blu-ray/DVD combo from a 2K scan of the original 16mm camera negative looking so spotless and boldly colorful it could have been shot yesterday. Such an idea produced on a higher budget might have exploited its sound design in Dolby Stereo or Ultra Stereo but the DTS-HD Master Audio 1.0 rendition of the mono soundtrack has more than enough presence, drawing the viewer in with cool highlights like the recurring Soft Cell track and repelling with the industrial music sounds and electronic manipulations. Optional English subtitles are available for the German dialogue only while an English SDH track translates and transcribes all dialogue as well as denotes sound effects and transcribes song lyrics.

New to the Blu-ray release is an audio commentary by critic, author and film programmer Kier-La Janisse who provides a lot of background information on the film and the musicians involved (Muscha having been the diminutive nickname for a real musician who reportedly filmed his own suicide in later years). She discusses how New York painter turned underground actor Rice came to be involved in the film through his appearance in Amos Poe's SUBWAY RIDERS by way of DECODER producer Klaus Maeck wanting a similar look from that film's cinematographer Johanna Heer. La Janisse also provides context for the political and punk music scene of the time and the film as a sort of "cultural exchange" with its international collaboration of artists as well as couching the film alongside the more "conventional" German New Wave thriller DER FAN.

Also new is "Sound as a Weapon” (37:38), an interview with Maeck who reveals that a lack of preparation while working on another film prevented him from being able to record a commentary track but, surrounded with material from the film, he provides an informative and entertaining discussion, discussing the inspiration from the Burroughs text, his interest in the deployment of Muzak – the film was originally going to be called HAMBURGER WARS (burger meaning "civil" in German) and he wanted to use MacDonald's rather than the fictional H. Burger), Einheit was living in the same commune has he, and he realized his shortcomings in writing and brought in Trimpop who had already written an earlier film with Muscha, and Felscherinow's coming to Hamburg to get away from drugs and the notoriety of her life adapted into film and the look they gave her to make her less recognizable. He also admits that some of the performances are bad and the dialogue is lacking, while also revealing the circumstances that lead to getting to shoot Burroughs while he was in London on a tour. The disc's other new extra is a locations "Then and Now" comparison (2:26).

The archival audio interview with Maeck (45:20) from the DVD seems as though it must have been one of the sources he consulted in preparation for the newer interview as it provides the basic framework for the discussion with the same anecdotes sometimes repeated in the newer one verbatim. The DVD featured excerpts from "Pirate Tape" (4:54) with a new introduction in which Maeck reveals that one of Burroughs' entourage during the London shoot who had a Super 8 camera with him turned out to be filmmaker Derek Jarman (SEBASTIANE) who subsequently edited and put music to the footage he shot of the shoot. Video footage from the 1982 Berlin riots (9:34) excerpted in the film is also presented as an extra with clearer views of Einheit wandering amidst the chaos. Also ported over is "Decoder Collective" (10:08), a mini-documentary on the Italian collective founded in 1986, as well as the film's theatrical trailer (2:20) and a stills gallery (6:02). The disc comes with a reversible cover while the first 2,000 copies ordered directly from Vinegar Syndrome come with a special limited edition embossed slipcover designed by Derek Gabryszak. (Eric Cotenas)

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