Death is just the Beginning|May. 27, 1987|West Germany|71 Min.|n/A
Genre: Drama;Horror
Description: The 1987 film “Nekromantik” follows the story of Rob Schmadtke, a man employed by “Joe’s Cleaning Agency,” a company responsible for removing corpses from public spaces and cleaning up accident sites. The company’s emblem features a Totenkopf (skull and crossbones) within a pentagram. Rob’s job allows him to indulge in his dark obsession: necrophilia. He lives with his girlfriend Betty in an apartment filled with macabre decor, including preserved human remains, pictures of infamous killers, and jars containing human parts preserved in formaldehyde. Betty often bathes in blood-tainted water, adding to the unsettling atmosphere.
The film opens with a disturbing scene of a couple who die in a car accident after losing their way at night. The next day, their bodies are discovered—the man inside the car and the woman outside, her body severed in two. Later, Rob becomes fixated on the corpse of a gardener who was accidentally shot by a man hunting birds. After finding the gardener’s decaying body in a pond, Rob steals it and brings it home as a gift for Betty. The couple then engages in a grotesque ménage à trois, using a modified steel pipe as a prop. This shocking scene is followed by another unsettling moment of frying meat.
Throughout the film, Rob’s disturbing fantasies and memories are revealed, including a graphic slaughter of a rabbit, implied to be a childhood pet killed by his father. These elements contribute to the film’s dark and controversial narrative, exploring themes of obsession and deviance.
Cast director: Jörg Buttgereit
Cast actor: Beatrice Manowski, Harald Lundt, Colloseo Schulzendorf, Volker Hauptvogel, Patricia Leipold, Franz Rodenkirchen, Daktari Lorenz
Original name: Nekromantik