Ali: Fear Eats the Soul

Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s New German Cinema classic follows Emmi, a 60-year-old widow whose mundane life as a cleaning lady is unexpectedly transformed when she happens upon a bar frequented by immigrants and meets Ali, a young Moroccan man.

As their relationship grows, they build a simple and loving life together, yet their joy is dampened by the stigma and judgement they face from their neighbours, co-workers and Emmi’s adult children, and as they become increasingly marginalised, these pressures begin to strain their relationship. Fear Eats the Soul remains a tender and painful depiction of love and societal prejudice, still tragically prescient more than 30 years after its release.