Werner Herzog films: c/d/s/d

i had seen chopped up short psa versions on tv; had no idea that was herzog

http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/videos/werner-herzog-tackles-texting-and-driving-in-devastating-documentary-20130809

"What AT&T proposed immediately clicked and connected inside of me," Herzog told the AP. "There's a completely new culture out there. I'm not a participant of texting and driving — or texting at all — but I see there's something going on in civilization which is coming with great vehemence at us."

Gah, I'm never going to txt again just to be safe.

The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser, playing at an exended sesh at the BFI is really one of his v best (along with Fata Morgana). Saw this on TV at 18 or so...on this viewing you pick up so much more on the cruelty, alienation, the failure of knowledge to provide any 'consolation', how downright dangerous its gaining is, through its sharpening of thought and enhanced processing of sensibility.

As for thoughts that Bruno S. was exploited - well, perhaps he was - but here he is so much more of a presence than Kinski ever was.

Looked great, from the expansive looking shots of the country to the grainy shots of dreams (Kaspar's mind will always be obscured). I'm sure the crew from Berberian Sound Studio have more than a passing familiarity with it - not criticizing, its a well known film.

I forgot how straight AND funny Nosferatu is. This is possibly the first time the German-lang version has been screened in the US?

I simply don’t like the culture of drugs. I never liked the hippies for it. I think it was a mistake to be all the time stoned and on weed. It didn’t look right and it doesn’t look right today either and the damage drugs have done to civilizations are too enormous. And besides, I don’t need any drug to step out of myself. I don’t want them and I do not need them. And you may not believe this, big-eyed as you sit here now, but I’ve not even taken a puff of weed in my life.

...I do not refuse it. I just pass the joint on to the next and let them do it. It’s their business. I don’t want to do it. Actually, I was completely stoned once with the composer Florian Fricke in Popol Vuh. I was at his home and he had pancakes and marmalade. And I smeared the marmalade and he started chuckling and chuckling. And I ate it and it tasted very well and I wanted another one and took another good amount of the marmalade and the marmalade had weed in it. He didn’t even tell me. I was so stoned that it took me an hour to find my home in Munich. I circled the block for a full hour until finding my place. So I have had the experience....

There was nothing traumatic about growing up for kids in post-war Germany. Of course it was traumatic for those who were a little bit older who had to flee, who were refugees and fled from the Polish border and were on tracks, and the left and right rape of women, and burnt-out villages and bombs coming down and things like that. A friend of mine who is a painter was in a bunker when the bombs hit his town of Hamburg. Almost everyone perished. And he was there 48 hours in this basement, flooded, and his aunt held him above water level for 48 hours, until they were rescued. The water was almost up to the chin of his aunt, and she held him above water level. So yes, when it comes to that, that is traumatic. And no wonder he became an artist!

http://www.vulture.com/2014/07/werner-herzog-box-set-transcript.html

...I do not refuse it. I just pass the joint on to the next and let them do it.

Tips 4 lyfe..

Can't believe I've smoked more pot than Werner Herzog.

As if I needed another reason to love Popol Vuh! Nice one, Florian.

Florian seems to have been a bit of a prankster, around Herzog anyway

no wonder he became a artist!!!

and whats your excuse you never even did pot lol!!!

I'd like for WH to narrate a documentary of me digging up the root balls and bush stumps along the side of my house. Something mundane but sweaty like that.

I'd like to know more about the lighter side of Florian Fricke, pls!

aguirre wrath of god is amazing, love how it degenerates into a sort of ceci n'est pas un arrow in my leg existentialist insanity. some of the deaths are as blackly comic as any on film

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxhac0bWENY

"into the abyss" is really underrated. a masterpiece imo. he deals with crushing poverty and the nature of violence and the american prison-industrial complex with the genuine curiosity and empathy for humans+love of strange details that marks all of his best work.

Gunning for an Oscar?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJ0xy9euq24

That dialogue sounds awful.

Perhaps the people who put that trailer together were trying to tell us how bad this movie is and that we ought to stay away. After watching it, that would make the most sense to me.

i see white people

when was the last decent werner herzog fiction feature?

something in the 80s probably. I assume he just uses his fiction feature incomes to fund his documentaries, which are by far his strength.

I know there are fans of his Bad Lt around here but I was pretty bored by it

"This video is private"

something in the 80s probably. I assume he just uses his fiction feature incomes to fund his documentaries, which are by far his strength.

― Οὖτις, Monday, July 6, 2015 2:23 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i doubt that; it's probably easier for him to find financing for the documentaries than the features, which haven't made very much money lately.

i mean "cave of forgotten dreams" made nearly as much money as "rescue dawn," and the latter must have cost much, much more

when was the last decent werner herzog fiction feature?

Probably Fitzcarraldo if truth be told. Have never seen that Green Ants thing but have it on good authority that it's not very good. The ending of Cobra Verde is great but you have to sit through the rest of the film to get there. Haven't seen anything since.

and Fitzcarraldo isn't that good either

he gets funding from discovery for his documentaries.
last good fiction piece was "my son my son what have ye done" last GREAT was probably "fitzcarraldo"

honestly his documentaries are often kind of formless and lazy these days -- they skate by on the innate fascination of the subject matter + herzog's still-charming persona

that said "into the abyss" was quite powerful

but i'm not a /huge/ herzog fan to begin with

he is a great interviewer and knows how to shoot/frame things = I will always watch his docs

My Son My Son, Rescue Dawn and Bad Lieutenant are all worthwhile in different ways imo, this new one seems like bad news, though.

speaking of herzog docs, watched how much wood could a woodchuck chuck for the first time yesterday & unless i'm very much mistaken the master of ceremonies announcing the winners right at the end is the same guy that played the smarmy banker dude in stroszek

http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/werner-herzog-talks-virtual-reality

Is there such a thing as a non-virtual-reality story?

I think you have to start right there. All human encounters are ambiguous. Even the perfect personal encounters are ambiguous in all societies, in all age groups, in all historical phases. And you see this ambiguity very clearly, for example, when you are on Facebook. This ambiguity, and this definition, is apparently the source of all your questions. Do we already live in a virtual reality? Did Rome, in antiquity, live in some sort of virtual reality?

Looking forward to Lo And Behold

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pv8Qj0Vkbo

" I take them as my unpaid bodyguards and let them do battle out there for me. It’s funny because there are Werner Herzogs out there who answer questions about filmmaking and do all sorts of funny things like create films I’ve never heard of."

I am Werner Herzog, the filmmaker. AMA.

Nobby Stiles? You're having a laugh, Werner.

http://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/video/werner-herzog-picks-his-favourite-england-players

He had a new one streaming for free on MUBI yesterday, 'Family Romance, LLC', about a company in Japan that rents stand-in family members. Anyone catch it?

Not spectacular, but I liked it, and it was a nice little play with the ideas of what's real and what's fake, and was funny in a rather sad & awkward kind of a way. The company is apparently real and the main guy plays himself in this film, but acting out fictional scenarios devised by Herzog. It's filmed in a very raw style, so could feel like a basic documentary much of the time, and has an odd, stilted, rather awkward vibe as well.

Loved the short scene of the guy in the train station getting a dressing down.

there was a piece in the new yorker about this phenomenon, no ?

Didn’t get around to watching it, but it’s on MUBI now for members.

Yeah, I think that piece was what inspired the film, budo jeru. According to The Observer today it was this one from 2018 written by Elif Batuman that set Herzog to making the film: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/04/30/japans-rent-a-family-industry

Yesterday the film had a wee intro from Herzog and a short 10-15 min. Q&A between him and someone from MUBI... wonder if that's included with the ongoing streaming?

Saw it yesterday and agreed on its relative strengths. It felt like a scenario in an early 70s film that was transposed to a current setting where it actually happens.

Still has the 5 minute intro. Is the Q&A at the end?

Yeah, the Q&A is still at the end.

the vulcanology film, The Fire Within, is on bbc4 tonight at 9pm

We're watching WHERE THE GREEN ANTS DREAM on VHS lol. I didn't know anything about it (in spite of seeing most? many? Herzog films) so I wasn't sure what it was about or anything and have been enjoying it so far.

We also recently watched THE FIRE WITHIN and I really liked it. We tried to watch the Miranda July movie about the Kraffts ("Fire of Love") and I found it unbearable but typically (for me) the Herzog approach was significantly more appealing.