DOCSLIB.ORG

Werner Herzog, a Journey to Romanticism

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Werner Herzog, a Journey to Romanticism WERNER HERZOG, A JOURNEY TO ROMANTICISM Written by Jules Cook 19/04/2020 Student Number: 180423 This research project will focus on Werner Herzog and his work, in particular ‘Grizzly Man’, the documentary from 2005 to analyse how, why and with what effect real-life stories and situations are used as the basis of their film and/or TV work. The following critical and theoretical approaches of Cinéma-Vérité, German New Cinema and Romanticism will be employed. HERZOG, GERMAN CINEMA AND FILM DECADENCE After the Second World War, Germany emancipated itself through art and cinema. Slowly detaching itself from Nazism and propaganda cinema. Freedom of speech marked the beginning of a new era for a new artistic film movement: The German New Cinema. Making its debuts in the early sixties, some ‘auteur’ filmmakers have surfaced from post war, wasteland Germany. Amongst them, Reine Werner Fassbinder, Wim Wenders, Werner Herzog and others… They were all more or less animated to present a commentary on Germany in a way that awakened criticism from the audience. They saw film as a way to shock and in essence, change society. German New Cinema was an opportunity for young filmmakers to make their debuts in the cinema industry, as most of the films were made with a very low budget (an average of £200,000 per film at the time). And indeed, the government was very involved in the funding of new German auteurs after the Oberhausen Manifesto, a document signed by 26 young filmmakers “claiming the right to create the New German Feature Film” in 1965, was put together. Although Werner Herzog moved into another direction at the end of the seventies, and although his feelings contradict, “I don’t really feel that I am part of the German Cinema. I work alone for the most part without a lot of contact” (Herzog; Ames: 2014:53). It is key to say that his contribution to German culture (in cinema and literature) was crucial. With his controversial experiments, conquest for authenticity with breathtaking feature films, he might have changed contemporary filmmaking and indeed German cultural history. It is not until later that Herzog dedicated himself to documentary filmmaking. A genre that he had mastered in his own way, experimented with, disregarding rules and conventions. The chaos that Werner Herzog exudes is something that made him catch the attention of the world of cinema. He believes that the best way to start in the industry of filmmaking is to steal a camera. He in fact, stole a camera from the Munich Institute for Film Research with which he shot his first eight feature films. He claims that the sole purpose of the camera was to be stolen by him, to fulfil its ‘destiny’. This aspect of Herzog makes people categorise his films as guerrilla style, and indeed, handheld camera, improvised takes are dominant across Herzog’s work. As absurd as it may sound, this same chaos is also reflected through his persona, in interviews, but also in his own films. He has strong opinions on cultural matters and sets of ideas, as he proved with his Minnesota Declaration for example. He sees Cinema as an athletic constitution “I believe I gained a physical sense for movement. […] For me making a film is a really physical labour.” (Herzog; Ames: 2014:54). And indeed, to accomplish authenticity in his films, he uses real elements, life-sized props, like the steamboat in ‘Fitzcarraldo’. This exacerbated devotion is in essence what truly makes Herzog, Herzog. An artist of decadence. He believes that pilgrimage, walking by foot, is the only way to prove devotion to someone else. In 1974, he walked from Munich to Paris by foot, in the span of three weeks, to ‘prevent the death’ of Lotte Eisner, here is a quote from ‘Of Walking in Ice’, a book he wrote that documents his journey: “At the end of November 1974, a friend from Paris called and told me that Lotte Eisner was seriously ill and would probably die. I said that this must not be, not at this time, German cinema could not do without her now, we would not permit her death. I took a jacket, a compass, and a duffel bag with the necessities. My boots were so solid and new that I had confidence in them. I set off on the most direct route to Paris, in full faith, believing that she would stay alive if I came on foot.” (Herzog: 1978:7) Lotte Eisner was a well-known writer and film critic. She was not only, Herzog’s dear friend, but she was also his mentor. She represented for him, the heritage of German Cinema, “German Cinema could not do without her now, we would not permit her death…” (Herzog; Erman: 2015). She embodied the traditions of filmmaking during the Weimar regime “and furnished a useful past for the directors who would constitute the New German Cinema” (Erman: 2015). She was fundamentally Herzog’s last link between the old world (of cinema and Germany), and the contemporary world. This explains a lot of inspiration from German Expressionist Cinema especially through Herzog’s own work of fiction. In the beginning of the 1960’s, a new model of cameras that used 16mm film was created. Unlike the usual 35mm cameras at the time, they were less bulky and more easily transportable. It inevitably led to a new genre of documentary filmmaking: “cinéma-vérité”, or “direct cinema”. One of its main predecessors Jean Rouch described the genre as “a deeper level of truth about the world than the ‘imperfect human eye’” (Rouch; Cousins, Macdonald: 2006:249). It, in essence, captures the truth as it is, in its immediate intimacy. Many of the films following the genre are handheld, usually wobbly and at times, out of focus. Some criticize cinéma-vérité and argue that the so-called ‘fly on the wall’ is a mere illusion. In fact, the camera makes the subject behave a certain way that could be perhaps unnatural or unreal. “We have been too sophisticated for too long to think that documentary can be “life caught unawares” in any meaningfully unmediated way because appearing before the documentary camera cannot normally avoid awareness, a source of audience distrust.” (Wang, Vanstone, Winston: 2017:85) Furthermore, new waves of documentary approach followed, opposed to ‘cinema-vérité’ and believe that it is the Documentary filmmaker’s job to show the objectified truth, in reality, documentaries will never be less than primarily subjective. The lens and the editing are indeed a reflection of the filmmaker’s vision: we are seeing the truth: through the eyes of someone else. “[There is] a crucial shift in the documentary idiom, almost an epistemological break, in which the old idea of objectivity is seen as naïve and outmoded, and is revoked by asserting the subjective identity of the filmmaker within the text of the film’”. (Saunders 2010:77) Werner Herzog’s desire to show real life stories is contradicted by his opposition to cinéma- vérité. He defines the film genre as being ‘fact oriented and primitive’. “It is the accountant’s truth, merely skirting the surface of what constitutes a deeper form of truth in cinema, reaching only the most banal level of understanding.” (Herzog; Cronin: 2014:287) He even gives an open critique to cinéma-vérité in his Minnesota Declaration, a manifesto he wrote in twelve points, sharing facts and beliefs about the Cinema of the Real. It goes on to say that, in order to compete with his opposite school of thought, he re-invents the documentary genre by blurring the line between fiction and non-fiction. “The line between fiction and documentary doesn’t exist for me. My documentaries are often fictions in disguise. All my films, every one of them, take facts, characters and stories and play with them in the same way.” (Herzog; Cronin, 2014:287). Herzog undoubtedly manages to fool us as an audience. He does this not only in his fiction films, where he shoots authentic landscapes, situations and scenery like in ‘Fitzcarraldo’ (1983; Figure 1), in which he dragged a real steamboat over a slope in Amazonian Peru, but he also fools us in his documentaries, where he has asked some of his subjects to recite dialogue or perform specific acts. In ‘Bells from the Deep’ (1993; Figure 2), he hired drunken Russian men to play the part of pilgrims in search of the lost city of Kitezh. The purpose of this trickery isn’t only to fool us. Herzog believes that in acting the truth lays a more sublime authenticity. As he calls it: “the ecstatic truth”. “There are deeper strata of truth in cinema, and there is such a thing as poetic, ecstatic truth. It is mysterious and elusive, and can be reached only through fabrication and imagination and stylization." (Herzog) In other words, Herzog proclaims himself to be an artist or a poet instead of a documentary filmmaker. Bill Nichols in his ‘Introduction to Documentary’ (2001) distinguishes the ‘poetic mode’ as a separate genre of documentary filmmaking. He argues that Poetic Documentaries are purposely detaching themselves from the objective truth and instead, follow a narrative showing the filmmakers’ philosophies. This is precisely what Herzog does in his non-fiction work. In ‘Grizzly Man’ (2005) for example, he interrupts Timothy Treadwell’s monologues many times to give his separate, yet entirely opposite point of view in order to alter the narration. A MODERN PHILOSOPHER Landscapes are omnipresent in Herzog’s films. He does this not only as a reminder of how small humanity is compared to the greatness of nature, but also builds a background that is similar to an otherworldly fantasy universe.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Sage Global Template
    This is a manuscript of an article subsequently published as: Walz, M., Hoyer, P. and Statler, M. (2016). After Herzog: Blurring fact and fiction in visual organizational ethnography. Journal of Organizational Ethnography, 5(3): 202-218. The published version can be accessed here: http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/JOE-07-2016-0017 ©Emerald After Herzog: Blurring fact and fiction in visual organizational ethnography Markus Walz Stockholm Business School, Stockholm University, Sweden Patrizia Hoyer Research Institute for Organizational Psychology, University of St. Gallen, Switzerland Matt Statler NYU Stern School of Business, New York University, USA Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to introduce the unique artistic approach of filmmaker Werner Herzog as an inspiration to rethink ethnographic studies in general and the notion of reflexivity in particular. Approach – This paper reviews the particularities of Werner Herzog’s approach to film making, linking them to the methodological tradition of visual ethnography and especially the debate about the role of reflexivity and performativity in research. Findings – Herzog’s conceptualization of meaning as ‘ecstatic truth’ offers an avenue for visual organizational ethnographers to rethink reflexivity and performativity, reframe research findings and reorganize research activities. The combination of multiple media and the strong authorial involvement exhibited in Herzog’s work, can inspire and guide the development of ‘meaningful’ organizational ethnographies. Originality/value – The paper argues that practicing visual organizational ethnography ‘after Herzog’ offers researchers an avenue to engage creatively with their research in novel and highly reflexive ways. It offers a different way to think through some of the challenges often associated with ethnographic research.
    [Show full text]
  • H Amm Er M Useum Spring 09
    24 Non Profit Org. Hammer Museum Spring 09 US Postage PAID 10899 Wilshire Boulevard Los Angeles, California 90024 USA Los Angeles, CA For additional program information: 310-443-7000 Permit no. 202 www.hammer.ucla.edu LLYN FOULKES. DELIVERANCE (DETAIL), 2007. MIXED MEDIA. 72 X 84 IN. (182.9 X 213.4 CM). COURTESY THE ARTIST AND KENT GALLERY, NEW YORK. PHOTO: RANDEL URBAUER. 100% recycled paper Spring 09Calendar Spring 25 3 2 news HAMMER NEWS director NEW HAMMER WEBSITE 1 the VISIT WWW.HAMMER.UCLA.EDU The Hammer launched its new website in November to rave A MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTOR reviews and received extraordinary visitor traffic from all from over the world, including unexpected places such as Iran, LOS ANGELES’S PULSE Namibia, and Pakistan. The Chronicle of Higher Education’s Lawrence Biemiller said: For more than a century artists working as writers, visual cultural collaborations. Opening in 2010, the Ring Festival LA artists, filmmakers, actors, and musicians have defined is a celebration, led by the LA Opera, of Wagner’s Ring Cycle, The “museum surpassed itself—and every message Los Angeles’s history and formed the city’s heart and soul. showcasing a variety of exhibitions, symposia, conferences, other museum I can think of.... Making so a much smart content available free online is a Every two years the Hammer mounts an invitational performances, and programs hosted by many of L.A.’s most exhibition that focuses on work created in L.A. These shows important cultural institutions. The Hammer will present a tremendous service to art and culture—a service COLLECTION NEWS other university museums would do well to study.” present opportunities for all of us to explore the vast wealth series of corresponding public programs exploring historical GIFT FROM THE ANDY WARHOL 1 of artistic expression this city has to offer.
    [Show full text]
  • Inicio Dissertacao
    UNIVERSIDADE ESTADUAL DE CAMPINAS Gabriel Kitofi Tonelo WERNER HERZOG, DOCUMENTARISTA: FIGURAS DA VOZ E DO CORPO CAMPINAS 2012 i ii UNIVERSIDADE ESTADUAL DE CAMPINAS INSTITUTO DE ARTES Gabriel Kitofi Tonelo WERNER HERZOG, DOCUMENTARISTA: FIGURAS DA VOZ E DO CORPO Dissertação de Mestrado apresentada ao Instituto de Artes da Universidade Estadual de Campinas para obtenção do Título de Mestre em Multimeios. Orientador: Prof. Dr. Fernão Vitor Pessoa de Almeida Ramos CAMPINAS, 2012 iii iv v vi Resumo Este trabalho pretende analisar a obra de documentários do cineasta alemão Werner Herzog sob a ótica da autorreflexão do diretor, através de sua voz e de seu corpo, em seus documentários e da relação estabelecida entre Herzog e a narrativa em cada filme. Procura- se estabelecer como a característica nasceu em sua filmografia e como evoluiu ao longo das cinco décadas de sua atividade como cineasta. Relacionam-se os processos da inserção de Werner Herzog em seus filmes com a teoria, própria do campo do Cinema Documentário, referente à inserção do sujeito-da-câmera na narrativa fílmica. Tomando como ponto de partida as reflexões surgidas no final da década de 1950 acerca da participação do cineasta na narrativa (Cinema Vérité) até as teorias de uma narrativa documentária profundamente voltada para o universo do próprio cineasta, popularizadas nos anos 1980, pode-se dizer que a autorreflexão do cineasta na narrativa é uma questão viva no campo teórico do Cinema Documentário e que é constantemente problematizada e renovada na produção documentária contemporânea. Palavras-Chave: Werner Herzog, Cinema Documentário, Subjetividade, Autoria. vii viii Abstract This work intends to analyse german filmmaker's Werner Herzog documentary ouevre, under the optics of the director's voice and body self-reflexion in his documentaries and the relationship between Herzog and his narratives in each work.
    [Show full text]
  • (Self-)Reflexivity and Repetition in Documentary
    Kent Academic Repository Full text document (pdf) Citation for published version UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) thesis, UNSPECIFIED. DOI Link to record in KAR https://kar.kent.ac.uk/87147/ Document Version UNSPECIFIED Copyright & reuse Content in the Kent Academic Repository is made available for research purposes. Unless otherwise stated all content is protected by copyright and in the absence of an open licence (eg Creative Commons), permissions for further reuse of content should be sought from the publisher, author or other copyright holder. Versions of research The version in the Kent Academic Repository may differ from the final published version. Users are advised to check http://kar.kent.ac.uk for the status of the paper. Users should always cite the published version of record. Enquiries For any further enquiries regarding the licence status of this document, please contact: [email protected] If you believe this document infringes copyright then please contact the KAR admin team with the take-down information provided at http://kar.kent.ac.uk/contact.html Subjectivity, (Self-)reflexivity and Repetition in Documentary Silke Panse PhD-Thesis 2007 Film Studies School of Drama, Film and the Visual Arts University of Kent Canterbury Abstract This thesis advances a deterritorialised reading of documentary on several levels: firstly, with respect to the difference between non-fiction and fiction, allowing for a fluctuation between both. As this thesis examines the movements of subjective documentary between self-reflexivity and reflexivity, it argues against an understanding of reflexivity as something that is emotionally distanced from its object and thus relies on a strict separation from both the subject and what it documents, such as for instance the stable irony in many found footage or mock-documentaries.
    [Show full text]
  • Konstruktion Und Dekonstruktion Des Star-Images Im Mockumentary
    Masterarbeit zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades Master of Arts in Filmwissenschaft der Philosophischen Fakultät der Universität Zürich im Rahmen des universitätsübergreifenden Masterstudienprogramms Netzwerk Cinema CH Konstruktion und Dekonstruktion des Star-Images im Mockumentary Eine Analyse der Filme I'M STILL HERE, INCIDENT AT LOCH NESS und THE BURIED SECRET OF M. NIGHT SHYAMALAN Verfasserin: Fabienne Berner Matrikel-Nr.: 06-687-594 Referentin: Prof. Dr. Margrit Tröhler Seminar für Filmwissenschaft Abgabedatum: 08.01.2016 Inhaltsverzeichnis 1. Einleitung 1 1.1 Filmkorpus 2 1.2 Thesen 4 1.3 Vorgehen und Aufbau 5 2. Mockumentary 6 2.1 Definitionsansätze 7 2.2 Authentizität und Dokumentarfilm 8 2.3 Das Spiel mit Authentisierungsstrategien 9 2.4 Pragmatische Fassbarkeit des Phänomens 11 2.5 Dokumentarisierende und fiktionalisierende Lekt,re 13 2.6 Die enunziative Haltung 15 2.7 Grade der Reflexivität 16 3. Star-Images 19 3.1 Theoretische Ansätze 19 3.2 Drei Star-Images 25 3.2.1 Joaquin Phoenix 25 3.2.2 Werner Herzog 28 3.2.3 M. Night Shyamalan 29 4. Analyse: Konstruktion und Dekonstruktion von Star-Images im Mockumentary 32 4.1 I'M STILL HERE (2010) 32 4.1.1 Paratextuelle Ebene ‒ Von der Idee bis zur Filmpremiere 32 4.1.2 Innerfilmische Ebene 36 4.1.3 Paratextuelle Ebene: Kinostart und Rezeption in den Medien 44 4.1.4 Paratextuelle Ebene: DVD 46 4.1.5 Fazit zu I'M STILL HERE 47 4.2 INCIDENT AT LOCH NESS (2004) 49 4.2.1 Paratexutelle Ebene ‒ Von der Idee bis zur Filmpremiere 49 4.2.2 Innerfilmische Ebene 52 4.2.3 Paratextuelle Ebene: Kinostart und Rezeption in den Medien 61 4.2.4 Paratextuelle Ebene: DVD 62 4.2.5 Fazit zu INCIDENT AT LOCH NESS 65 4.3 THE BURIED SECRET OF M.
    [Show full text]
  • Copyrighted Material
    1 Herzog and Auteurism Performing Authenticity Brigitte Peucker Michel Ichat ’ s Victoire sur l ’ Annapurna (1953) is incomplete, André Bazin tells the reader of “Cinema and Exploration,” because an avalanche “snatched the camera out of the hands of [Maurice] Herzog” (1967: 162). Bazin ’ s description conjures up a film camera immersed in snow, its lens obscured. No act of photographic registration can take place here: there is no distance between the hapless camera and its object. Struggling to delineate cinematic realism, Bazin evokes a limit case in bringing the real into the film frame, one in which the camera seized by an avalanche figures the collapse of world with filmic apparatus. Its existential weight intensified by its unrepresentability, Maurice Herzog ’ s peak experience is sublime. It ’ s the explorer ’ s brush with death that evokes Bazin ’ s central metaphor for the indexical image: the Veil of Veronica “pressed to the face of human suffering” (1967: 163). I have long suspected that Bazin ’ s account is what inspired Werner Stipetić to change his name to Werner Herzog, perhaps also to assume his particular aesthetic stance, since Bazin ’ s story contains all the lineaments of the portrait Herzog draws of himself as auteur. It ’ s the portrait of someone for whom the conquering of a mountain is co-extensive with filming it, for whom filmmaking demands a physical investment, and landscapes produce essential images because death lurks in the natural world. Most centrally, it ’ s the portrait of a filmmaker for whom authenticity is at stake. But what is the nature of this “authenticity”? It doesn ’ t reside in Bazinian realism in a strict sense, although it ’ s connected to its more metaphorical, expanded expression.
    [Show full text]
  • UNIVERSAL PICTURES and MEDIA RIGHTS CAPITAL Present A
    UNIVERSAL PICTURES and MEDIA RIGHTS CAPITAL Present A GAMBIT PICTURES Production In Association With ELECTRIC SHEPHERD Productions A Film by GEORGE NOLFI MATT DAMON EMILY BLUNT ANTHONY MACKIE JOHN SLATTERY MICHAEL KELLY and TERENCE STAMP Executive Producers ISA DICK HACKETT JONATHAN GORDON Produced by MICHAEL HACKETT GEORGE NOLFI BILL CARRARO CHRIS MOORE Based Upon the Short Story “Adjustment Team” by PHILIP K. DICK Screenplay by GEORGE NOLFI Directed by GEORGE NOLFI – 1 – CAST Orthopedic Surgeon . SANDI CARROLL (In Order of Appearance) Newscaster Daniel Bazile . AS HIMSELF Adrian Troussant, Elise’s Fiancé . SHANE MCRAE David Norris . MATT DAMON Cedar Lake Receptionist . MEGHAN ANDREWS Suburban Moms . LISA THORESON Court Registrar . SANDRA BERRIOS FLORENCE KASTRINER Thompson’s Aides . DAVID ALAN BASCHE Suburban Neighbors . PHYLLIS MCBRYDE JOEL DE LA FUENTE NATALIE E. CARTER MIKE DISALVO Chuck Scarborough . AS HIMSELF DMV Clerk . DINA CATALDI Jon Stewart . AS HIMSELF Courthouse Security Officer . PAUL DIPAOLA U.S. Coast Guard Officer . CAPT. GREGORY P. HITCHEN New Yorker in Courthouse Lobby . JASON KRAVITS Upstate Farmer . DARRELL JAMES LENORMAND County Clerk . PETER JAY FERNANDEZ Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg . AS HIMSELF Court Officer . LAWRENCE LERITZ Charlie Traynor . MICHAEL KELLY Bureau Headquarters Staff . PETER BENSON Political Consultants . KAR LEROY MCCLAIN R.J. KONNER BRIT WHITTLE Reporter . SUSAN D. MICHAELS WAYNE SCOTT MILLER Harry Mitchell . ANTHONY MACKIE LORENZO PISONI Albert, Campaign Aide . GREGORY LAY BART WILDER Robyn, Campaign Aide . LAUREN HODGES Stunt Coordinator . G.A. AGUILAR James Carville . AS HIMSELF “David” Stunt Double . AARON VEXLER Mary Matalin . AS HERSELF Stunt Performers . JILL BROWN Richardson . JOHN SLATTERY ACQUI CARRERA Senior Campaign Aide . AMANDA MASON WARREN OHN CENATIEMPO Elise Sellas .
    [Show full text]
  • Archaeogaming
    edition) Copy. Use (COVID-19 distribute.2020 Personalnot Do March Archaeogaming 21 edition) Copy. Use (COVID-19 distribute.2020 Personalnot Do March 21 edition) Copy. Archaeogaming Use (COVID-19 An Introduction to Archaeology distribute.2020 Personalnot Do March 21 in and of Video Games Andrew Reinhard berghahn N E W Y O R K • O X F O R D www.berghahnbooks.com First published in 2018 by Berghahn Books www.berghahnbooks.com © 2018 Andrew Reinhard All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without written permission of the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Reinhard, Andrew, author. Title: Archaeogaming: An Introduction to Archaeologyedition) in and of Video Games / Andrew Reinhard. Description: New York: Berghahn Books, 2018. | Includes bibliographical Copy. references and index. (COVID-19 Identifi ers: LCCN 2018005079 (print)Use | LCCN 2018005777 (ebook) | ISBN 9781785338748 (Ebook) distribute.| ISBN2020 9781785338724 (hardback: alk. paper) Personalnot Subjects: LCSH: Virtual reality in archaeology. | Imaging systems in Do March archaeology. | Archaeology—Computer21 simulation. | Video games— Technological innovations. Classifi cation: LCC CC79.I44 (ebook) | LCC CC79.I44 R45 2018 (print) | DDC 930.10285—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018005079 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978-1-78533-872-4 hardback ISBN 978-1-78533-873-1 paperback ISBN 978-1-78533-874-8 ebook edition) Homer’s Odyssey and Nishikado’s Space Invaders Copy.
    [Show full text]
  • Sammlung Werner Herzog Bestandsliste
    Sammlung Werner Herzog Bestandsliste INHALTSVERZEICHNIS 1. FILME VON WERNER HERZOG 4 AGUIRRE, DER ZORN GOTTES 4 AUCH ZWERGE HABEN KLEIN ANGEFANGEN 5 BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL - NEW ORLEANS 6 BALLADE VOM KLEINEN SOLDATEN 6 BEHINDERTE ZUKUNFT 6 BEISPIELLOSE VERTEIDIGUNG DER FESTUNG DEUTSCHKREUTZ, DIE 7 BOHÈME, LA 7 CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS 7 COBRA VERDE 8 DEATH ROW 9 ECHOS AUS EINEM DÜSTEREN REICH 9 ENCOUNTERS AT THE END OF THE WORLD 10 FATA MORGANA 10 FITZCARRALDO 11 FLIEGENDEN ÄRZTE VON OSTAFRIKA, DIE 12 GASHERBRUM - DER LEUCHTENDE BERG 13 GESUALDO - TOD FÜR FÜNF STIMMEN 14 GLAUBE UND WÄHRUNG 14 GLOCKEN AUS DER TIEFE 15 GRIZZLY MAN 16 GROSSE EKSTASE DES BILDSCHNITZERS STEINER, DIE 16 HERZ AUS GLAS 17 HOW MUCH WOOD WOULD A WOODCHUCK CHUCK 18 HUIE'S PREDIGT 18 INVINCIBLE 19 JAG MANDIR. DAS EXZENTRISCHE PRIVATTHEATER DES MAHARADJAH VON UDAIPUR 20 JEDER FÜR SICH UND GOTT GEGEN ALLE 20 LAND DES SCHWEIGENS UND DER DUNKELHEIT 21 LEBENSZEICHEN 22 LEKTIONEN IN FINSTERNIS 23 LITTLE DIETER NEEDS TO FLY / FLUCHT AUS LAOS 24 MASSNAHMEN GEGEN FANATIKER 24 MEIN LIEBSTER FEIND 25 MIT MIR WILL NIEMAND SPIELEN 25 MY SON, MY SON, WHAT HAVE YE DONE 26 NEUE WELTEN - GOTT UND DIE BELADENEN 26 NOSFERATU - PHANTOM DER NACHT 27 PILGRIMAGE 28 RESCUE DAWN 28 SCHREI AUS STEIN 29 SOUFRIÈRE, LA 29 STROSZEK 30 TEN MINUTES OLDER: THE TRUMPET 31 VERWANDLUNG DER WELT IN MUSIK. BAYREUTH VOR DER PREMIERE, DIE 31 WERNER HERZOG – FILMEMACHER 32 WHEEL OF TIME 32 WHITE DIAMOND, THE 33 WILD BLUE YONDER, THE 34 WINGS OF HOPE / JULIANES STURZ IN DEN DSCHUNGEL 35 WODAABE - DIE HIRTEN DER SONNE 36 WO DIE GRÜNEN AMEISEN TRÄUMEN 37 WOYZECK 38 2.
    [Show full text]
  • Spoofing Herzog and Herzog Spoofing
    In the upcoming season of The Boondocks , the animated comedy series about an African- American family that moves from the South Side of Chicago to the imaginary suburb of Woodcrest, one episode takes the form of a documentary news program made for German television. Filled with excitement for Barack Obama’s victory, a German reporter travels to Woodcrest, presumably to interview locals about the U.S. presidential election. The cartoon reporter is not only named Werner Herzog and illustrated to resemble him. The character is voiced by Herzog himself. At the present writing, the episode is still in production, but even so it points to the many existing Herzog parodies and self-parodies that are the subject of this essay. 1 Herzog is an easy target of parody, not least because he insistently projects an exaggerated self-image of unbending, one-sided seriousness. Consider the following statement of his: “I am someone who takes everything very literally. I simply do not understand irony,” a claim he has made for decades now. 2 How are we supposed to take this claim, literally or figuratively? The very status of such extreme literalness is unclear. What is clear, however, is that both elements – his supposed lack of irony and the gloomy seriousness he exudes in making this claim – play into existing stereotypes about German identity and about the German filmmaker in particular. Herzog is not just aware of these stereotypes. 3 Over time, he has developed certain strategies for appropriating and refunctioning them. In this essay, I want to concentrate on his use of parody and self-parody.
    [Show full text]
  • Germanness, the Nation, and Its Other
    GERMANNESS, THE NATION, AND ITS OTHER By WILLIAM E. LEHMAN A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2008 1 © 2008 William E. Lehman 2 This dissertation is dedicated to Ernesto Suárez and Lee C. Greenough—may their memory be for a blessing. 3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Many people have helped me to complete this dissertation. I would first like to acknowledge the abundant help and support of the members of my committee: Nora Alter, Eric Kligerman, Barbara Mennel, and Efraín Barradas. I would also like to thank Annemarie Sykes for her support during my many, many years as a graduate student at the University of Florida. Many thanks as well to Margit Grieb, who not only read and re-read everything I have written, but has also given me so much support in every other conceivable way. Furthermore, I would like to thank the following for their insufficiently acknowledged but always appreciated love, support, and friendship in the last five years: Eduardo Garcia, Stein-Atle Vere, Christian Ulvog, Britta Herdegen, Michael “Nussbaum” Garvin, Michael Julian, Michael Newman, Oscar, Carmelita, and, last but certainly not least, Milo Schuman. 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...............................................................................................................4 ABSTRACT .....................................................................................................................................7
    [Show full text]
  • Herzog Conference Paper Final
    Finding the “Truth” 1 Society for Cinema and Media Studies Conference 2012 Cesare Wright Adjunct Lecturer, Rice University President, Kino-Eye Center for Visual Innovation Finding the “Truth” Rhetoric and Actuality in the Documentary Tradition Cutting the “Dull Bits” – A cinematic rhetoric: Alfred Hitchcock famously describes film as “life with the dull bits cut out”.1 Yet, despite their “dullness”, these forsaken “bits” contain a richness of subjective experience that defines our identity as embodied and enworlded beings (Sobchack, 1992). The strategically constructed nature of film thus comes at a cost – a distinct filmic lack. Film theorist Bill Nichol’s (1991) highlights the necessary incompleteness and inadequacy of representation, which he addresses in his discussion of “questions of magnitude”, through which he makes the case that the re-presented image is always partial, secondary, vicarious, and of a lesser order than the primary or direct encounter. The audience must therefore be persuaded to overcome the excess of unrepresentable “magnitude” and engage the fractured filmic world as complete, at least to the degree necessary for the narrative to function. Insofar as rhetoric relates to the strategic ordering and manipulation of fact, in the service of persuasion, it is the rhetorical job of cinema to account for and overcome filmic lack by employing the mechanisms of cinematic illusion. Further, the evidentiary role of facts in Aristotelian rhetoric is necessarily mediated by the 1 Quote attributed to Alfred Hitchcock. Finding the “Truth” 2 “artistic proof”, through which representation advances the voice and intent of the author (Nichols, 1991, p. 134). Though documentary, by definition, deals with the audio-visual “documenting” of events, the rhetorical articulation of these filmic events is not so straightforward.
    [Show full text]