Stroszek is neatly divided between the old world of Berlin shadows and the new world, lying under one mammoth shadow. When Bruno S. is released from prison, he seems to be just rounding the track of another relay race. 'It all moves in circles,' he shouts, above the mild admonitions of a functionary at the prison. Bruno's cry has the prophetic tone of all his proclamatory acting in Herzog's films. The movement within the film then fulfils Bruno's worst fears: from prison to freedom and back again has until now been the pattern, and when Berlin's working class district, Kreuzberg, proves to be a static ghetto of static violence, Bruno tries to widen the circle to extend to the shores of American freedom. The circle then becomes a motif of absurdity, which can be traced from the clawing dance of the glassy-eyed chicken to the machine that...