Monday, April 11, 2011

Lessons of Darkness (1992, Werner Herzog)



I think I am starting to get Herzog. Aguirre: The Wrath of God left me very underwhelmed and I didn't like it for some inexplicable reason, but his documentaries (if you want to call them that) seem to really click with me. And Lessons of Darkness is the best film I have seen from Herzog yet, an incredible masterpiece and true visionary film.

Simply put, Lessons of Darkness is one of the most spectacular goddamn things I have ever seen.


Running at only a brief 54 minutes, Herzog presents a highly unconventional experimental documentary, loosely structured with chapters, of the after-math of the Gulf wars and the occurring oil fires. The film is one of the most amazingly audacious and bombastic apocalyptic visions I have ever seen. Herzog edits the film together like some maniacal maestro, with his sparse narration never better, carrying with it an at times biblical presence, as he quotes from the Book of Revelations. So cold and raw and amazing. There are only two (brief) interviews in the film; one where a woman tries to recount the torture and death of her son, but she is so traumatized that she literally cannot speak; and the other between a young mother (a widow) and her young boy, who tells how her young son was stomped on and traumatized so harshly that he won't speak. Whether these interviews were staged or not is not really important to me. In Herzog's visual poem, words cannot describe the destruction and despair, so fittingly it is told through images and sound. The rest of the film, apart from Herzog's occasional narration, is played with silence, save for the booming classical music and the droning noise of oil and water and flames and bubbling oil. The mostly faceless engineer workers, trying to put out the oil fires, at times look like some kind of extraterrestrials standing amidst the geysers of flames.

Additionally, what makes Lessons of Darkness unique is that it refuses to make any cheap political statement. Others have described the experience as like being an alien staring down in bewilderment of the perplexing and reckless nature of the human species, our tendency towards demise, destruction, and death. I suppose some might find this as too overly arty and heavy, but I personally eat this shit up.

Furthermore, it is an unbelievably insane film, with Herzog's depiction of this wasteland being haunting and unforgettable, both staggeringly beautiful and frightening at the same time. It is a hypnotizing experience as you get lost in the chaos of it all. And there are so many images I won't forget. There really aren't many films, if any, that I have seen like this. At only 54 minutes, it left me perhaps wanting even more, but I can't fault it for that. I think Herzog told us all he wanted to tell. I loved this even more than 
Grizzly Man, which is another masterwork documentary.

10/10 

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Sidney Lumet RIP (1924 - 2011)


A legendary American director (and a favorite of mine), Sidney Lumet, has left us today, dead at age 86. Making his departure even more saddening is the fact that, even at his older ager, he was still directing new films, including most recently the much acclaimed heist film of Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, released in 2007.

Despite having an extremely prolific career, his best film is perhaps his feature debut, the classic court-room drama, 12 Angry Men, a film which is amazingly cinematic and transcends its genre and becomes an extremely intense and profound exploration of group interaction -- an endlessly fascinating film which only gets better each viewing and is in my top 5 films.

Network, my second favorite film of his, is a masterpiece in outrageous satire, extremely compelling and brilliantly acted, one of the greatest scripts ever. I have also seen Fail-Safe, Serpico, and Dog Day Afternoon, each very good films and well worth seeing. But alas, there is still so much more to see, so I look forward to exploring more of his work.

RIP