(This review was written originally in parts as I watched this over a week and logged it as such on letterboxd)
First of all, how have I missed out on the striptease artists who do a number set to Morricone's A Fistfull of Dollars theme? (Though oddly enough it's Charles Bronson who has his face randomly on a wall in the strip joint?)
I'm about two parts into this, but my main impression is this is possibly the sweetest and warmest thing RWF wrote and directed - funny what being commissioned for German PBS will make you do. And that is a key distinction to make here: before this, in context, he was still a young filmmaker doing the kind of films he wanted to do, sometimes to some very extreme places (ie after writing Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant in as legend goes 11 hours on an airplane flight, he filmed it as a two character piece with many compositions and direction only he could or would do). To bring him on for a "family" series was brave and bold for the producers at the network... and compromises would be made. But I'll get to that later.
In part 1, we are mostly introduced to Jochen and Marion (Gottfried John and Hannah Schygulla), the former a worker in a factory and the latter a woman he meets by chance when looking around at night for something while out for a parry. The two fall in love, but we are largely brought into his worklife at this factory as he has to deal with the all too commonplace super super corporatist Make Life Suck For Workers management and the early stirrings of a workers strike (or at least how Jochen finds ways to make things better and worse and then better again). Part 2 is more on Jochen's elder married couple (Ullrich and Finck) who look to find and then procure space to make a Kindergarten for kids, and come up against first bureaucratic pressures and then from local moms who are a little wary - not to mention the authorities.
What I gather so far is that... the people in these families are trying to do right by those around them, and have love and care to give, but as in everyday life you always have jerks and malcontents gumming up things. Society expects both way too much and not enough of other people, whether it's in a factory or in trying to get rent for a place, and understanding how much someone really loves you can be immediate in some ways and take longer for little beats (again, that little trip to the strip club where Jochen talks with another woman and Marion gets jealous, and we get it, I mean look at that nose.) At the same time, he makes an optimistic but still powerful case through how the supporting characters come together - the co workers, the women with their Association - that collective action does work if applied like it should.
And stylistically this is all very pleasurable to take in because Fassbinder knows he has to shoot quickly for TV (five episodes of feature length aired over five months in fall/winter 1972/73), but doesn't sacrifice making interesting and even funny compositions (all those flowers framing Schygulla's face) and keen snap zooms. He's always shooting for performance and the actors are all inhabiting these regular people to effective and moving and startling effect; but for as "normal" as they may be compared to other provocative and dolorous Fassbinder creations, they still have an edge and distinctive personalities abound (oh, Kurt Raab).
Part 3:
Episode 3 "Franz and Ernst" wherein we have more factory/office drama as a Foreman is needed to be replaced and whether it's the bearded guy who has a lot of heart but needs to study a bit more to get to make the grade, or if it'll continue to be the straightforward and not bad but unremarkable replacement the management wants, and Jochen is given way too many of his favorite dish to eat. Oh, and Grandma continues to be Grandma. This is a series with such a generous amount of heart and spirit, it's like being surrounded by... a family with all the quirks and bad eggs and people who want to be better than they've been.
Part 4:
Or: our heroes Jochen and Marion get married and Kurt Raab, the seething, combustible madman of Fassbinder's work (between his work here, Herr R and Satan's Brew, that's a career there), uneasily agrees to a divorce from the wife he's kept under his thumb. There's a half hour reception after the very simply do e marriage where a dozen or more conversations happen and there's connections made and intrigued up and the drink makes everything flow a lot more... easily (its still PG-13 more or less).
It's also not till this part that the wonderful older woman from Ali Fear Eats the Soul is revealed to be Marion's mother, who is a little more than taken aback by the news that her daughter is marrying a "worker" and other news makes her more melancholic. In other words, this Parr is more of the flirting and talking and arguing and other highs and lows of life with couples and prospective couples.
Oh, and children understand adults can cry, too.
part 5:
In this final segment we see the workers finally make their demands and the major change that precipitates this, of the workers being told the factory will be moved and thus inconvenience everyone, gets the workers led by Jochen and the new Foreman to organize and find that the management is... oddly amenable, or at least one of them is. This also leads to some big discussions, like Jochen asking his parents if they would be willing to swap apartments (Jochens dad has a big scene which ends not how you think), and there are some other personal strands and things.
This last episode *doesn't feel like it's an ending and this is one of its strengths as if Fassbinder means to say "hey, not everything is going to get resolved, this is up to and including the problems with the factory and the management," and there's a sort of "Wait a moment" conversation Marion has with Jochen that means to make things a little deeper with the message of worker's rights and organizing. It almost feels too easy at a point, like "hey, wait, is Fassy getting a little soft in his message of Socialism and that the owners will just acquiesce so easily" is addressed ultimately, and I find that scene elevates the series/long-film in that a life of work is never resolvable. There's always going to be disagreements and exploitation and someone finding a way to squeeze workers to do more for less or to find a profit where it wasn't before.
But this isn't to say this is all an intellectual exercise, far from it, as RW knows this has to be all about the people and how much we care about Jochen and Marion and Grandma and everyone else as far as their relationships and their trust and respect for one another (or in the case of the workers that one blonde dipstick who is always making a stink and finally gets his this episode... or did he before, I forget). It's hard not to see the politics at play here and how RWF saw so clearly in the 70s what other countries (well, America mostly) has done their damndest and unfortunately largely succeeded in the years since to erode workers rights and do away with the kind of organic unionized state of things that Jochen and everyone gets into.
I don't think he was seeing things as being all the rosy, even if it seems on first glance like things will work out for these workers; it's a very long struggle to have just the basic stuff to make a working life tolerable, and I think Eight Hours Don't Make a Day is extraordinary for how he and his collaborators keep the style straightforward enough (his zoom lens does a lot of work but notice how he will keep a shot going and only use tracking or odd angles when he has to), so the people and their highs and lows become more striking.
It's about Ordinary People who's perseverance - lest not forget Grandma is an analogous plot line in the series with Jochen and Marion to an extent - and the realizations (and for Jochen self-actualization) of "This Must Change" make up the dramatic meat. I'm struck by how it's complications are in-between the lines in ways that usually Fassbinder makes more stark and bleak. It's his sunniest work I've seen.... which means it can still have a lot of tragedy. But the balance is powerful. And last but not least, what a soundtrack! Janis Joplin, Velvet Underground, the Stones, Neil Young, Jesus (ok Jesus isn't there that's just for emphasis).
(*according to the documentary on the Criterion disc, there were supposed supposed to be more episodes but they didn't go through. Oh, well. What's here still makes for a compelling finish)
(PS: my original opinion still stands - Berlin Alexanderplatz has higher heights than this gets, but Eight Hours is more consistent in it's dramaturgical aims. And World on a Wire is a little greater than both of them)
