Herbert Achternbusch

Herbert Achternbusch (né Schild; 23 November 1938 – 10 January 2022) was a German film director, writer and painter. He began as a writer of avant-garde prose, such as the novel Die Alexanderschlacht, before turning to low-budget films. He had a love-hate relationship with Bavaria which showed itself in his work. Some of his controversial films, such as Das Gespenst (The Ghost), were presented at the Berlinale festival.

Born Herbert Schild in 1938 in Munich, Achternbusch was the illegitimate son of the sports teacher Luise Schild, née Muckenthaler, and the dental technician Adolf Achternbusch. He grew up in the Bavarian Forest with his grandmother. In 1960, he was adopted by his biological father and took the name Achternbusch. After his Abitur in Cham, he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts, Nuremberg, and at the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich.

In the early 1970s, Achternbusch wrote the prose Die Alexanderschlacht, an important novel for the literary avant-garde of the time. Achternbusch produced almost 30 low budget films. He was often the leading actor in his films, and worked mainly with friends. In 1975, Achternbusch met actor Josef Bierbichler, who played in 15 of his films, partly without salary. Also notable were the actresses Annamirl Bierbichler [de] and Margarethe von Trotta, as well as actor and painter Heinz Braun and cinematographer Jörg Schmidt-Reitwein. In 1974, he made his film debut with Das Andechser Gefühl. The 1977 film Bierkampf [de] (Beerfight) caused attention with numerous drunk Oktoberfest visitors as involuntary amateur actors. Role models are the comedians Karl Valentin and Groucho Marx. His anarchist surrealistic films are not known to a wide audience in Germany, although one of them, Das Gespenst (The Ghost), caused a scandal in 1983 because of its alleged blasphemous contents, including a scene where Christ climbs down from the cross and later goes bathing with a nun. Federal Minister of the Interior Friedrich Zimmermann halted the funding for the film as it was deemed to have violated the "religious feeling of large parts of the population". For a long time, no public broadcaster showed any of Achternbusch's films. Years of legal battle ensued, with Achternbusch finally winning in 1992. In the 1983 film Der Depp, he had his favorite enemy Franz Josef Strauss poisoned.