Death is an Asshole

An unconventional undertaker and his team want to change radically how death and grief are tabooed in our society. Less reticence, more honesty, more empathy. But how do professional undertakers act when they have to handle cases that affect them personally and emotionally? A subtle, a concise documentary about Eric Wrede and his team in action.

DEATH IS AN ASSHOLE is an artistic documentary about the innovative undertaker Eric Wrede and his team. How does the new generation of undertakers proceed, especially those who are interested in attending the bereaved with empathy and who want to facilitate new ways of mourning? And how do these modern professional undertakers deal with cases that affect them personally and emotionally? It is not just Eric Wrede's approach which is innovative, but also the film itself: we approach the tabooed topics of death and grief without depicting prevalent stereotypical situations. We observe very attentively: the important and sensitive consultations with the bereaved, the final dressing of the deceased, internal preparations and postprocessing of the team. "If you spend a day with Eric Wrede (...), death loses some of its terror." (Süddeutsche Zeitung)

With Eric Wrede, Maria Schuster, Katja Seydel, Siv-Marie Wrede, Gabi Kohn, Marco Ammer

2025
Seal of Approval ‘highly recommended’
46 FFMOP – Filmfestival Max Ophuels Preis

The sudden, unexpected death of Jasmin, a fifty-year-old homeless protagonist of our last documentary "INNdependence", would not let go of me in the course of 2020. Thus, her sister, who had not spoken to Jasmin for several years, contacted me and wanted to know what kind of person her sister had been before her death. Through several intimate conversations I became involved with this ill-fated family and attended – as one of seven mourners - Jasmin's welfare funeral. This unexpected confrontation with death lead me to recall a lecture I had attended in 2018, where Eric Wrede had presented his book "The End" in which he propagated a new approach to death and grief.
Death definitely IS an asshole, but when you spend some time with Eric and his team, it loses some of its terror – this is also what we want to achieve with our film.