Rat Race
Directed by Valentin Hitz
Viewed at the San Francisco
International Film Festival


This has a cheese prize hidden in every tunnel... Shot in grainy black + white, set in an anonymous future, we follow the mis/adventures of Kater.
Kater is a "rat racer", heavy gambler and big time loser... in fact he has had to sell most of his internal organs to pay off his debts. There is a thriving black market in stolen organs, and (luckily) you can take drugs to substitute for your missing organs. It's like fixing a hardware problem with software!
This film is similar to Goddard's moody low tech sci-fi "Alphaville", though more graphic, gory and surreal. Kater is promoted to "brain robber" using the nifty "organ extractor drill device" to "extract" his booty, and pay his debts. Meanwhile back at the ranch... rival brain robbers steal his girlfriend's (Maria) brain and his boss "the Doctor" decides to make her his "special project". There is an interesting mix of poetic reminiscences of love and hope with gory violence in a nightmarish and surreal black and white future...

Reviewed by Eric Michel, FilmCities

Rat Race
Country: Austria
Year: 1998
Running Time: 60 Min.
Cast
Haymon Maria Buttinger, Proschat Madani, Roman Kaminski, Michaela Leutzendorff, Stefan Wieland, Christian Weinberger
Editor: Torsten Heinemann
Cinematographer: Martin Gschlacht