In the Basement

Director Ulrich Seidl's oddball documentary focuses on hobbies that his Austrian compatriots enjoy in the basement—an area of the homes that is generally free from prying eyes. One elderly gent invites the members of his brass band to rehearse and drink in rooms filled with his cherished Nazi memorabilia. A hunter enthuses over the stuffed animal heads on his walls. A woman enters a storage room filled with dolls, which she gently extracts from their boxes and coos over like a mother waking her children. A man singing operatic arias at the top of his lungs also has a gun range in his basement. Midway through, the emphasis turns decidedly kinky as the camera visits a salesgirl-turned-prostitute and a client who brags about his potency, a woman who indulges in sadomasochism (and, ironically, works at a charity assisting victims of domestic abuse), and—most unsettling of all—a couple who play out a sexually-explicit sex-slave fantasy, with the corpulent, hirsute, and completely naked male acceding to every wish of a partner who can be brutally demanding. How much of this is truly documentary footage and how much is staged is somewhat unclear, but all is artfully arranged into formalized tableaux—characteristic of Seidl's style. A fascinating, frequently disturbing glimpse into the dark corners of the Austrian psyche, this is recommended for more adventurous collections. (F. Swietek)