1974: Fifty Years Later / Ali: Fear Eats the Soul

Last year, the Pink Smoke Podcast created a series called 1974: 50 Years Later, each episode featuring a different guest who chose a 1974 movie to talk about, ranging from giant blockbusters to minor cult curios and everything else in between. But since all our guests are cool outsiders with eccentric tastes, most of them stayed away from the most iconic movies of that fabled cinematic year, eschewing The Godfather Part II in favor of forgotten TV movies and experimental horror films. While that was just fine with us, we decided it might be a good idea to back up and cover some of the acknowledged classics of 1974, starting with Rainer Werner Fassbinder's Ali: Fear Eats the Soul. The first of four projects released by the ultra-prolific auteur (two theatrical, two for TV), Ali tells the tale of a 60-year-old window cleaner who falls in love with a Moroccan Gastarbeiter half her age, much to the disapproval of their contemporaries. One of the enfant terrible's more gentle movies, it's still populated by his lovably repellent characters in whom Fassbinder seeks to excavate some humanity in a miserable post-war West German society. We discuss the director's destructive creativity, how his worldview is more complicated than those of directors with whom he's often connected (Douglas Sirk and Ken Loach fans maybe give this one a miss) and how his most endearing and connective theme is loneliness. Support our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thepinksmoke The Pink Smoke site: www.thepinksmoke.com The Pink Smoke on X: twitter.com/thepinksmoke Christopher Funderburg on X: twitter.com/cfunderburg John Cribbs on X: twitter.com/TheLastMachine Intro music: Unleash the Bastards / "Tea for Two" Outro music: Marcus Pinn / "Vegas"