“Fata Morgana” (1971)
Often retrospectively cited as a sister film to the much better “Lessons of Darkness,” this doc on the Sahara Desert may only exist to make a case for the importance of the Herzog personality, something we may take for granted now, but back in the early ’70s wasn’t yet established. And “Fata Morgana” (which is a complex type of mirage) has all the hallmarks of what we’d come to know as a typically magical Herzog doc—beautiful tracking shots enhanced by operatic music (plus the occasional Leonard Cohen song), weird moments with the subjects, poetic voiceover—but it’s missing one key ingredient: the energy the filmmaker can deliver with his own playful narration. Instead, it’s the voice of French-German film critic Lotte Eisner, who reads the director’s musings as if she’s in second grade and forced to read her homework in front of the class. It makes the 79 minutes of the film seem a great deal longer, and renders it a bit of a chore to get through. Still, the shots are beautiful, and the insight into the nearby community is penetratingly human, even if now feels insignificant in comparison to his later heights in the format. [C+]
“Land of Silence and Darkness” (1971)
Documentaries by Werner Herzog are often characterized by the filmmaker himself: his presence, his solemn, sometimes unintentionally hilarious, overly grave Germanic voiceover, and his occasionally manipulative editorializing. Regular documentaries, he often has stated, are for “accountants.” And while not quite bookkeeping, in contrast to latter-era documentaries where the presence of Herr Herzog threatens to (enjoyably) overshadow the subject at hand, “Land of Silence and Darkness” is one of his most reserved and unaffected. Herzog makes no appearance and utters not a word. Instead, fittingly, this documentary about Fini Strabinger, a Bavarian woman who went deaf and blind at the age of 18 and then worked to help other women with similar disabilities, grants its handicapped subjects the utmost dignity it can by simply letting Fini and her friends tell their own stories. Effective and powerful in its simple and unembellished, verite presentation, Herzog illustrates a deep empathy for these marginalized people living lives of joy and richness despite the inability to see or hear. Unsentimental and yet moving, Herzog’s portrait does not traffic in pity, sympathy or pedestrian notions of “celebrating” the unfortunate. The filmmaker simply treats Fini and her forgotten friends as regular documentary subjects and therefore vividly captures all the traits that color them as unique as you or I, while simultaneously exploring the nature of communication. [B/B+]
“Aguirre, The Wrath of God” (1972)
It’s never about the destination in a Herzog movie, but rather the journey. And no descent into madness has been as meticulously captured on film as the mental breakdown that is the darkness of Lope de Aguirre. As the maniacal explorer hellbent on finding the lost city of gold, Klaus Kinski gives a performance powered almost entirely by the fever dreams of a maniac, as his unhinged conquistador leads his charges into almost-certain death, pursuing not riches, but the absolute megalomaniac power of man over men, and over nature. It was the first of several near-deadly collaborations between the inextricably paired actor and director, though if you knew nothing of their volatile relationship, you would imagine this film showcases their final team-up. Shot in dangerous real-life locations in the Peruvian rainforest, ‘Aguirre‘ feels less like a movie and more like the experience of walking on a tightrope over jagged shards of glass, the push-and-pull between Herzog’s single-minded absorption by the elements (accompanied by a haunting Popol Vuh score) and Kinski’s terrifying all-timer of a performance creating a lightning-in-a-bottle greatness no other filmmaker-actor team could begin to accomplish. [A+]
“The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner” (1974)
If you’re looking for 45 minutes of documentary perfection, you can find it on YouTube under the heading “The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner.” Herzog’s film about Swiss sky-flying champion Walter Steiner was made for German TV (who apparently mandated that Herzog appear on camera—something he had not tended to do to that point) but is as fine an exemplar of what at extraordinary documentarian Herzog can be as anything we’ve seen on the big screen. Steiner’s pre-eminence in his field (the film follows him winning his first gold medal in Planice in 1972) is remarkable, but it’s coupled to a prickly, aloof, serious personality—he is as much about rules and safety and fear for himself and other jumpers as he is a maverick who just wants to fly, baby. The running time is lean, but somehow every beat that Herzog finds; every snippet of interview; every beautiful, still-breathtaking slow motion shot of the skiers flying through the air, bodies almost horizontal, while the excellent Popol Vuh music plays; every piece to camera Herzog himself delivers—everything feels perfectly judged to deliver an instantly compelling snapshot portrait of exceptionalism. And it culminates in a story about Steiner’s childhood pet, a raven he raised himself, which is so apropos that it approaches transcendent and layers a very Herzogian, almost mythic resonance onto an already fascinating study. [A]