Project Herzog

Werner Herzog is one of the most creative film makers of the last forty years. Known for employing non-actors to provide realistic performances that are often not seen outside of documentary film, Herzog’s work has a sense of realism, despite the fact that he would never let the “truth” get in the way of telling a good story.

His employment of actor Klaus Kinski in some of his earliest and most critically acclaimed films such as Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972) and Fitzcarraldo (1982) helped establish Herzog as a notable part of the New German Cinema. However, Herzog’s brilliance as a film maker might best illustrated in his unique portrayal of the human condition through the sometimes bizarre and often obsessive characters that he has either discovered or created. Whether at war with nature, or questioning the universe, Herzog’s films provide fascinating insights into his own sensibilities, philosophies, and struggles with reality (Klaus Ming March 2013).

The Official Werner Herzog site: http://www.wernerherzog.com/

My attempt to watch and review in 100 words or less, the Herzog Filmography:

1962 Herakles
1964 Spiel im Sand (Game in the Sand)
1966 Die beispiellose Verteidigung der Festung Deutschkreutz (The Unprecedented Defence of the Fortress Deutschkreutz)
1967 Letzte Worte (Last Words)
1968 Lebenszeichen (Signs of Life)
1969 Maßnahmen gegen Fanatiker (Precautions against Fanatics)
1969 Die fliegenden Ärzte von Ostafrika (The Flying Doctors of East Africa)
1970 Auch Zwerge haben klein angefangen (Even Dwarfs Started Small)
1970 Fata Morgana
1971 Behinderte Zukunft (Handicapped Future)
1971 Land des Schweigens und der Dunkelheit (Land of Silence and Darkness)
1972 Aguirre der Zorn Gottes (Aguirre, the Wrath of God)
1973 Die große Ekstase des Bildschnitzers Steiner (The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner)
1974 Jeder für sich und Gott gegen alle (The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser: Every Man for Himself and God against All)
1976 Herz aus Glas (Heart of Glass)
1976 How Much Wood Would a Woodchuck Chuck
1976 Mit mir will keiner spielen (No One Will Play with Me)
1976 Stroszek
1977 La Soufrière
1978 Nosferatu Phantom der Nacht (Nosferatu the Vampyre)
1979 Woyzeck
1980 God’s Angry Man
1980 Huie’s Sermon
1982 Fitzcarraldo
1984 Die Ballade vom kleinen Soldaten (Ballad of the Little Soldier)
1984 Gasherbrum – der leuchtende Berg (The Dark Glow of the Mountains)
1984 Wo die grünen Ameisen träumen (Where the Green Ants Dream)
1987 Cobra Verde
1988 Les Gauloises
1989 Wodaabe die Hirten der Sonne (Wodaabe – Herdsmen of the Sun)
1990 Echos aus einem düsteren Reich (Echoes from a Sombre Empire)
1991 Jag Mandir: Das exzentrische Privattheater des Maharadscha von Udaipur (Jag Mandir: The Eccentric Private Theater of the Maharaja of Udaipur)
1991 Schrei aus Stein (Scream of Stone)
1991 Film Lektionen (Film Lesson)
1992 Lektionen in Finsternis (Lessons of Darkness)
1993 Glocken aus der Tiefe (Bells from the Deep)
1994 Die Verwandlung der Welt in Musik (The Transformation of the World into Music)
1995 Tod für fünf Stimmen (Death for Five Voices)
1997 Little Dieter Needs to Fly
1999 Schwingen der Hoffnung aka Julianes Sturz in den Dschungel (Wings of Hope)
1999 Mein liebster Feind (My Best Fiend)
1999 Gott und die Beladenen (The Lord and the Laden)
2000 Invincible
2001 Pilgrimage
2001 Ten Thousand Years Older
2002 Christ and Demons in New Spain
2003 Rad der Zeit (Wheel of Time)
2004 The White Diamond
2005 Grizzly Man
2005 The Wild Blue Yonder
2006 Rescue Dawn
2007 Encounters at the End of The World
2008 Bad Lieutenant: Port Of Call New Orleans
2009 My Son My Son What Have Ye Done
2009 La Bohéme
2010 Cave of Forgotten Dreams
2010 Ode to the Dawn of Man
2011 Into the Abyss – A Tale of Death, a Tale of Life
2012/13 On Death Row I + II
2013 From One Second to the Next
2014 Queen of the Desert
2016 Salt and Fire
2016 Lo & Behold, Reveries of the Connected World
2016 Into the Inferno
2018 Meeting Gorbachev

 

Some of my favorite quotes attributed to Werner Herzog

“I love nature but against my better judgment”.

“When I saw the dancing chicken, I knew I would create a grand metaphor — for what, I don’ t know”.

“We have to articulate ourselves, otherwise we would be cows in the field”.

“You can fight a rumor only with an even wilder rumor”.

“I simply do not understand irony, a defect I have had ever since I was able to think independently”.

“I believe the common denominator of the universe is not harmony; but chaos, hostility and murder”.

“If you’re purely after facts, please buy yourself the phone directory of Manhattan. It has four million times correct facts. But it doesn’t illuminate”.

“I shouldn’t make movies anymore. I should go to a lunatic asylum”.