From abyss to inferno, life is never easy or boring for/with Werner Herzog, who has had a continuously radical, single-minded and uniquely apocalyptic artistic output over the past half century. Call it majestic, call it pompous, his voice has been louder than bombs across continents, his vocabulary mirroring his cinematic language. Let's run through his very own doomsday ABC (despite his new-found love for romantic drama, see QUEEN OF THE DESERT and SALT AND FIRE at TIFF16) to prepare ourselves for the INFERNO (also at TIFF16 and I daresay your better bet):
Abyss. A bottomless hell. And an apt metaphor for capital punishment in one of his great documentary works.
Angry. As in "God's Angry Man" (significantly, one of several Herzog films invoking god, looking for god or featuring Jesus) Herzog's lesser known 1981 documentary on religious fervour and greed. It stars a cymbal-banging toy monkey.
Darkness. Lessons of. The Gulf War. Blaise Pascal's quote: "The collapse of the stellar universe will occur –like creation– in grandiose splendor." sets the mood for the 16mm shock-and-awe doc on destruction and eco-catastrophe, using a vocabulary of doom in imagery and intertitles that reference "satan", "torture", "battle", "fire".
"The
Enigma of Kaspar Hauser". The character of Bruno S. is one of Herzog's most wronged and abused, the filmmaker even labelled him "the unknown soldier of the cinema."
"Precautions against
Fanatics" sounds like a timely film these days. But the 12-minute short from 1969 that Herzog called a "joke" is certainly not what one might infer from the title (one word: flamingos).
See for yourself.
Fiend. My Best. About Werner Herzog's most intense love-hate relationship, that with his lead actor BFF Klaus Kinski, who starred in five of his best-known films.
"Into the
Inferno". Herzog does volcanoes and North Korea. Say no more.
"Invincible". A film starring Tim Roth and German chansonnier Max Raabe with music by famed German film composer Hans Zimmer might actually be invincible.
"The Killers". Okay, I tricked you again. Sounds scary but is a
mini music doc on the famous US band. How did I miss this? Catch up
here.
"Scream of Stone". The Bavarian's natural habitat, the mountains, a recurring motif in his oeuvre. Here about the conquest of the Cerro Torre in Argentina, said to be one of the world's most dangerous climbs, as the title so evocatively alludes to.
"Nosferatu the
Vampyre". His
hommage to Murnau.
"The
Wild Blue Yonder" = Herzog tackles the final arthouse frontier, sci-fi. UFOs, NASA, Roswell, say no more.
Zorn. German for
Wrath. Aka Klaus Kinski.
+++ (Encounters at)
THE END (of the World) +++
by
Jutta Brendemühl
