Ali: Fear Eats the Soul

1974 PG-13 1h 33m

7.7 / 10 452

RATING

7.7/10

452

YOUR RATING

Emmi Kurowski, a cleaning lady, is lonely in her old age. Her husband died years ago, and her grown children offer little companionship. One night she goes to a bar frequented by Arab immigrants and strikes up a friendship with middle-aged mechanic Ali. Their relationship soon develops into something more, and Emmi's family and neighbors criticize their spontaneous marriage. Soon Emmi and Ali are forced to confront their own insecurities about their future.

Director Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Writers

Rainer Werner Fassbinder

Stars

Brigitte Mira El Hedi ben Salem Irm Hermann

Rainer Werner Fassbinder

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User Reviews 2

Geronimo1967 4 Sep 2025

7/10

Does anyone remember when Channel 4 (in the UK) had their Friday night red triangle zone of late night adult films that would probably have been X-certificate but that were available free-to-air? I think this is probably the only one of those I still recall as it memorably challenges just about every stereotype in the dictionary. The elderly and widowed “Emmi” (Brigitte Mara) meets the handsome an...

CRCulver 24 Jul 2018

6/10

The original title of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's 1974 film "Fear Eats the Soul" is deliberately ungrammatical German: ANGST ESSEN SEELE AUF "Fear Eat Soul". That is due to one of the two protagonists we meet: Ali (El Hedi ben Salem) is a Moroccan immigrant working in Munich. He toils as a car repairman and has learned some very basic German, but he has been hindered from assimilating to German and...