A bank robbery in Munich goes south, ending in a hostage-taking and a wave of violence. Loosely modelled on actual crimes, this German-Italian entry in the giallo genre is an impressive blend of realistic and over-the-top elements.

With creative director Farah Bouamar, screenwriter Samuel Gheist, and author/director Till Kleinert, moderator Jenni Zylka explores the vampire movie revival and current developments in genre cinema.

Under the torrid sun in an abandoned desert settlement, there is a lethal battle over the spoils of a bank robbery. This heady spaghetti western features psychedelic music by Cologne kraut-rockers Can.

A broke dropout blackmails a sociology professor after discovering that his dissertation was a plagiary. This action-packed film version of a “sociological thriller” set in Berlin was Wolfgang Petersen’s lead-in to a Hollywood career.

While a German couple is on their honeymoon in the USA, the groom is kidnapped by an ambulance crew. His bride joins forces with a trucker to try and find him. This 1979 thriller about the illicit trade in human organs triggered fierce debate at the time.

A bank robber comes to Munich to ask for his ex-wife’s help in “laundering” the stolen money. He is soon running from a detective and a gaggle of other greedy pursuers. A black-and-white thriller in CinemaScope inspired by American B-movies.

A macho engineer has a problem with his girlfriend working as an auto mechanic. She sets about arousing the jealousy of her old-fashioned boyfriend. Set at East Germany’s Leipzig Trade Fair, this musical rom-com struck a blow for the Working Woman.

A bloodthirsty aristocrat and his followers terrorise an entire region – until the people rise up against them. A visually rich, fascinating genre film that echoes the politics of its time. Based loosely on leitmotifs from Bram Stoker’s “Dracula”.

A vampire re-awakes 100 years after she was bitten by Count Dracula. The title character finds work, and victims, as a mortuary cosmetologist in Vienna. The film is a genre mix of horror, thriller and crude jokes that sported a notable cast for the time.

A young woman is raped in the night. But her real nightmare begins the following morning. A stark “rape without revenge” exploitation film that is a disquieting thematic exploration of toxic systemic masculinity.

A group of women from an alien realm shrink men by sleeping with them, and then kidnap them as sex slaves. But one of them falls in love with her victim. An enchanting satire of the soft-sex film genre with burlesque and poetic elements.

To hide his lisp, a commercial artist stops talking altogether. Hailed as a savvy innovator, he advances to become director of an ad agency. Armin Mueller-Stahl is brilliant in this subversive satire of a dysfunctional East German working environment.

A school principal and her girls’ football team battle it out with the town’s men’s team, which has been accorded unheard-of privileges by the mayor. A saucy musical featuring snazzy choreography and the East German pop stars Chris Doerk and Frank Schöbel.

The philandering Orpheus is forced to go to the rescue of his adulterous wife Eurydice who has been spirited away to Hades. This opulent film version of Jacques Offenbach’s suggestive operetta is full of satirical jabs at life in East Germany.

A rocker boss from Hamburg and a 14-year-old drifter help each other out in a milieu teeming with violence. Shot on location with a non-professional cast, this down and dirty biker flick paints an authentic picture of a big-city subculture.

The Retrospective curators in discussion with directors Jan Bonny and Christoph Hochhäusler about the film selections for the section and the question of whether the relationship between German movies and genre cinema is really “complicated”.

Ulli Lommel’s film about a serial killer in the early post-war era echoes the real story of “wolf man” murderer Fritz Haarmann. A mix of Fritz Lang’s M and Hitchcock’s Psycho that follows in the tradition of Weimar cinema.