Mutzenbacher (Ruth Beckermann, 2022) (Patreon)

Having now seen three films by Ruth Beckermann, I'm more confused than anything. Does she have a discernible unified project? Her work seems to have the rigorous conceptual bent one so often finds in Austrian cinema. But Mutzenbacher strikes me as a concept in search of its proper cinematic expression. There's just nothing terribly interesting here. A group of Austrian men responded to a casting call, and they are asked to read portions of the anonymously published 1906 novel Josefine Mutzenbacher, or the Life of a Viennese Whore, with Beckermann filming them and asking questions.

The underlying idea is that male sexuality is at least in part defined by pornographic material such as the Mutzenbacher novel, and by asking these men to engage with portions of the text, they will have to confront the role of pornography in society, in their own fantasies, and in relation to women. But as with any such experiment, the results are mixed. Some men seem embarrased, while others display no real emotion. A few critique the prose and its inherent sexism. But that's about it. Mutzenbacher actually reminded me of another experimental documentary, Adina Pintilie's 2018 Golden Bear winner Touch Me Not. Could it be that our age has finally made eroticism boring?