„Humanity’s / Veins opened like a book / And scribbling in its blood“
Anatomie Titus traces a via dolorosa through the modern world, telling its story in fourteen tableaux, and presenting a global narrative with an international cast. The film uses a three-part split screen whose sequences run synchronously, and unites cinematic and theatrical elements. It transfers the historical content of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus to a modern global context, while at the same time evoking timeless mythological moments. The text consists almost entirely of the section of commentary from Heiner Müller’s adaptation of Titus Andronicus, Anatomie Titus Fall of Rome.
Titus Andronicus is a revenge cycle of escalating atrocity that concludes with the destruction of the ancient Roman house of the Andronicii. The initiating event for the tragedy is the sacrifice of the Goth queen Tamora’s first born son to Mars, the god of war. Following his victory over her in battle, the Roman general Titus Andronicus has her son killed in accordance with ancient tradition, ignoring the entreaties of his mother. From that point on, Tamora plots her revenge together with her slave and lover Aaron. After returning to Rome with the Goth queen as his captive and concubine, the victorious general Titus offers the new emperor Satruninus his daughter Lavinia’s hand in marriage. However, Lavinia refuses the match, and the emperor proceeds instead to marry Tamora, Titus’ concubine. This is the first in a series of humiliations that Titus will suffer, setting in motion the cycle of revenge: while out hunting, Tamora’s two sons kill Lavinia’s betrothed, the emperor’s brother, and rape Lavinia. Although the attackers cut off her hands and tongue, she nevertheless manages to reveal their identity. Now it is Titus’ turn to take revenge: he invites Tamora and Saturninus to dinner at his house, kills Tamora’s sons and serves them baked in a pie to their mother and the emperor, in a kind of grotesque parody of civilized manners. The last act of revenge is left to Lucius, Titus’ youngest son.
The film Anatomie Titus takes as its main protagonists the play’s female characters; Titus’ young daughter Lavinia, played by Anna Müller, and the Goth queen he brings back from war as his concubine and who later becomes empress of Rome, played by Jeanne Moreau. At the same time they act as narrators for the action of the film. The plot is also accompanied by a performance by dancers from the Berlin State Ballet. Anatomie Titus has been produced in cooperation with Berlin’s Akademie der Künste.