Unearthed
The Lonely Killers
Les tueurs fous | Boris Szulzinger | BE 1972 | 82 Min
| DCP
Metro Historisch
Sa,20.09.▸18:00
Mistrust of young people had already had a long cinematic (often sensationalistic) tradition when Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange shocked audiences in 1971. A year later, The Lonely Killers were sicced on unsuspecting Belgians. The latter movie, however, has deep roots in reality, not only because it is based on a true story, but also because we get to roam Brussels and surroundings with the gay sociopaths Roland and Dominique, while they occasionally stop and look bored and disgusted for their next victim. Riveting, radical, and thoroughly ambivalent, director Boris Szulzinger’s portrait of two serial killers was almost one and a half decades ahead of John McNaughton’s staggering Henry. (Thomas Taborsky)
Boris Szulzinger
Boris Szulzinger (1945–2023) was a Belgian director, screenwriter, and producer. In his versatile career, he interned with Jean-Pierre Melville, worked as a reporter in the United States, directed commercials and short films, and was a close collaborator of the cartoonist Picha. He directed his first film, the adult-themed Love Under Age (1971), under an alias and followed it up the very next year with what would become his best known work, the serial-killer movie The Lonely Killers. Together with Picha, he made the animated feature Tarzoon: Shame of the Jungle (1975) and also co-produced the cartoonist’s 1987 adult animated sci-fi comedy The Big Bang. In 1980, he directed Louise Fletcher in Mama Dracula (1980), his final feature film.
Boris Szulzinger (1945–2023) was a Belgian director, screenwriter, and producer. In his versatile career, he interned with Jean-Pierre Melville, worked as a reporter in the United States, directed commercials and short films, and was a close collaborator of the cartoonist Picha. He directed his first film, the adult-themed Love Under Age (1971), under an alias and followed it up the very next year with what would become his best known work, the serial-killer movie The Lonely Killers. Together with Picha, he made the animated feature Tarzoon: Shame of the Jungle (1975) and also co-produced the cartoonist’s 1987 adult animated sci-fi comedy The Big Bang. In 1980, he directed Louise Fletcher in Mama Dracula (1980), his final feature film.
Screenings
Metro Historisch
Sa,20.09.▸18:00
