Garbage, The City, and Death

Overview

Garbage, The City, And Death is an eight-minute, single-channel video. It consists of three scenes from a Fassbinder play of the same title, which was banned from the stage in Germany in 1985. Garnett's adaptation consists of the scenes between Roma, the prostitute and Franz, her boyfriend/pimp. Garnett plays Franz and her half-sister, Joanna Coleman, plays Roma. The couple bickers over money problems, her undying love for him, and his general disgust with her (produced by his latent homosexuality). The film moves from the city, where they are living in their car, to the Salton Sea, to a hot tub in the night. This project was born out of a month-long visit between long-lost sisters who did not grow up together. Garnett uses Fassbinder’s text as a means of exploring concepts relating to sibling-hood that do not exist in her actual relationship with her sister – it is an illustration of how Garnett imagines sisters might fight. Sibling rivalry is warped here into a lovers’ quarrel.