"Der Todesking" is not exactly the type of film that makes you merry Jörg Buttgereit's second cult monument in a row, which is actually a lot better than the infamous "Nekromantik", exists of seven short episodes  one for each day of the week  revolving on unrelated people's suicides. In between these already very disturbing episodes, Buttgereit inserts truly horrifying images of a severely decomposing male corpse. The episodes aren't all equally powerful but, as a wholesome, "Der Todesking" is ranked quite high on the list of all-time most depressing art-house films. Particularly the episodes on Wednesday, involving a man explaining his sexual frustrations to a total stranger in the park, and the one of Sunday, focusing on a younger man molesting himself to dead, are extremely intense and devastating to observe. The added value of this film, or any other shockumenary like it, is debatable and I'm not even sure whether or not Buttgereit had any type of message to communicate here. There's the vague mentioning of an eerie chain letter that encourages its readers to commit suicide but mostly we remain uninformed about these people's motivations to end their lives so dramatically. Entirely unlike I expected, "Der Todesking" isn't exploitative or repulsively graphic! On the contrary actually, I never could have hoped Buttgereit would be so subtle and thoughtful regarding the portrayal of pure human misery. The Thursday episode is a perfect example of this, as it stylishly shows different viewpoints of a famous German bridge while the names, ages and occupations of persons who jumped off appear on the screen. The production values are inescapably poor and the editing often lacks professionalism, but this isn't what really counts in this type of cinema. The subject matter is strong and forcing us to contemplate about the less cheerful  but also indispensable  aspects of life. GREAT use of tragic music, too!

i saw this movie at the toronto film festival with fairly solid expectations. the movie has a great cast and was closing at the festival so it must be good, right? how wrong i was.
i knew we were in trouble when before the film the director was talking about how when he was directing an episode of wiseguy he met an unknown actor named kevin spacey (a director/writer of wiseguy making his feature debut = blah)... well the director/writer of Edison must have some incriminating pictures of kevin spacey killing a homeless man, because i cannot see how he (along with the other actors in the film) would ever agree to be in this disaster.
this movie is absolutely appalling! it's a mixture of every cop hard boiled cliché ever. there is nothing new with Edison. the acting was bad and the direction was even worse. it looked like that aforementioned episode of wiseguy. this was the best casted direct to video movie i've ever seen.
some examples of just bad silly moments in Edison... morgan freeman dancing around his apartment for no reason to rock and roll music... justin timberlake getting creative criticism from his belle while his apartment is surrounded by candles... llcoolj driving a vintage firebird... 3 guys being shot in the head...
this movie is the opposite of good.
STAY AWAY FROM EDISON!