Fassbinder slyly updates a 1929 German film, Mother Krausens' Journey to Happiness-in which a slum-dwelling mother's world is shattered when her son is arrested-to the Germany of the Economic Miracle. The middle-aged Frau Kü;sters (Brigitte Mira, of Ali: Fear Eats the Soul) is content to contribute to the Miracle by putting screws into plugs by the thousands, until the day her gentle husband mysteriously runs amok in the workplace, killing the boss's son and then himself. In her efforts to have it all make sense, the very lumpen Mother Kü;sters becomes the naive object of prying reporters and the darling of the Communist Party, who would make of her husband a martyr to capitalism, at least until the elections. Meanwhile, her sleazy chanteuse daughter Corinna (Ingrid Caven, naturally) mines the sensational killings for free publicity. Beautifully shot and framed to effect both deadpan parody and crisp Brechtian pathos, the film is shown in a new version with two endings: the unsparing original finale, and the American-release "happy ending" which some, including Fassbinder, held to be even more pessimistic. Repeated Friday, August 8.