Despair (film)

Despair is a 1978 film directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder and starring Dirk Bogarde, based on the novel of the same name by Vladimir Nabokov. It was entered into the 1978 Cannes Film Festival.

Hermann Hermann is a successful entrepreneur in the 1930s Germany. As the Nazis gradually rise to power, Hermann, who is a Russian migr, becomes increasingly frightened and mentally unstable. His attempts at leaving the country are accompanied by symptoms of madness, the most vivid being his belief that he found his exact double, although the person in question differs from him in every respect. He creates an elaborate plan that would allow him to flee to Switzerland, but it soon becomes unclear whether his voyage leads him to a neutral country or merely allows him to take refuge in his madness.

Source: Wikipedia