THE GLASS CELL
Dir. Hans Geißendörfer, 1978
Germany, 99 min.

FRDIAY, APRIL 5 – 10 PM
FRIDAY, APRIL 26 – 10 PM
MONDAY, APRIL 29 – 10 PM

Patricia Highsmith wrote a novel, The Glass Cell, based in part on letters she received from a fan in prison. Out of concern for prison conditions and the lasting damage of confinement, she crafted a crime story of an innocent man who is irrevocably changed by the five years he spends behind bars. It was adapted into a film by Hans Geißendörfer and nominated for an Academy Award in 1978.

Helmut Griem plays Philip, a sad-faced architect and family man. He is found the guilty party of a structural flaw at his company and serves five terrible years behind bars. He leaves prison only to enter a lifeless urban setting, steeped in drab greens and browns. Due to his criminal history, job interviews go nowhere and drinking becomes his distraction. Philip’s wife and son have developed close relationships with another father figure in his absence, namely the lawyer who poorly represented him in court. Hence a new prison-like environment develops within this family unit. It becomes unbearable until it is criminally unbearable…