The subti tle of Je an-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet’s fi rst featu re, from 1965 , “Only V iolence  Helps Wh ere Violence Re igns, ” sugg ests the fierc e politi cal pro gram evok ed by the ir rigorous aesthetic. The pretext of th e film,  set in Colog ne, is Hei nrich Böll’s  novel “Billia rds at Half Past N ine, ” which t hey stri p down t o a handful o f stark  events and film w ith a con frontation al angu larity ak in to Bartók’s  music that ado rns the soundtr ack. The sub tlest of cues  accompany t he story’s comple x flashbacks. The middle-ag ed Robert Fäh mel tells a  young hotel bel lhop of per secutions und er the  Third Reich; hi s elderly fa ther, Heinri ch, an arch itect famed fo r a local abbey,  recalls the mi litarism of t he First World  War, when his  wife,  Johanna,  incurred tro uble for i nsulting t he Kaiser.  A third-gene ration Fähmel is con sidering arch itecture, j ust as the  exiled bro ther of Robert ’s late wife,  returns, o nly to  be met by  their former torturer , now a We st Germa n official  taking part i n a celebrat ory parade of war veteran s. Straub and Hui llet make t he laye rs of his tory live i n the pr esent tense,  which they j udge severe ly. The tamp ed-down acting and  the spa re, tense vi sual rhetor ic suggest a s tate of moral crisis as we ll as the re sponse—as m uch in st yle as in sub stance—that i t demands .　　The su btitle of  Jean-Mar ie Straub  and Danièle  Huillet’s fir st feature, f rom 1965,  “Only Viole nce H