Manflesh of the Month: Werner Herzog

Such groovy hair

Recently, while in Brooklyn on my annual hang with two of my favorite people and one of my favorite cats, I spent a brisk morning shopping with my bestie in Williamsburg. Our favorite Bedford Ave institution, Spoonbill and Sugartown, had a handful of film auteur-themed totebags for sale: Varda, Kurosawa, Akerman, Fassbinder—you know, the Criterion Channel homies. But as soon as my friend spotted the one emblazoned with Werner Herzog, I knew I was not leaving without it. Thanks to Spotify’s latest audiobook venture, I spent December periodically listening to Every Man for Himself and God Against All, the print version of which was on prominent display at McNally Jackson that same morning. Seeing Werner’s worldly face always did make me smile. Now he helps me schlep around my shit.

At the birth of podcasting in 2004, I started listening on my original iPod, which resides on my shelf at home as a souvenir of days long past. It is currently a bonafide museum piece; I’ve spotted this model on display at two modern art museums in two countries. One of the first podcasts I ever subscribed to was Filmspotting, which is still going strong to this day, doing the good work of informed, thoughtful, and sober film criticism and analysis. In ’05, for one of their now famous movie marathons, the hosts decided to delve into the world of the legendary German filmmaker with the most improbably soothing voice on the planet.

Fascinated by their reviews of Werner’s early essential films, and armed with a Blockbuster DVD-by-mail account, I followed along, immediately taken by his fearless, seemingly reckless avant-garde methods of directing and shooting. Over the following two decades, I continued to follow his varied and prolific career, which, even with its oddball highs and lows, could never be accused of being boring.

One of my favorite moviegoing memories is going to the ArcLight Cinerama in Hollywood with two of my dearest friends in July of 2007 to see Rescue Dawn (2006). I was (and still am) enamored of both Steve Zahn and Werner, and Little Dieter Needs to Fly (1997), on which RD was based, is one of my fav documentaries. There was no way I was going to miss it. There was a premiere being prepared for in the lobby at the time (I believe it was for Bourne Ultimatum or some such) but we were too bent on our mission to screen the critically acclaimed and highly realistic depiction of Vietnam POW experiences to care. I thank my nonpareil friends for indulging my idiosyncratic obsessions enough to join me on this occasion, and I will always cherish it, especially since the historic Cinerama Dome is shuttered at the moment, its future still pending.

On the set of “Rescue Dawn” (2006)

Last month, I resolved to revisit films from Werner’s back catalog, many of which are conveniently available on Tubi. It’s a pleasure to rewatch these now canonical documentaries and dramas. Werner has become an inimitable, familiar old friend, telling stories as charming as they are beguiling.

The last few years, I have been bemused by the recent prevalence of Herzogesque voice impressions infusing TikTok and Instagram and whatnot. My earliest recollection of one was in 2010, when someone made a short mockumentary about the classic children’s book series, Where’s Waldo? It was a brilliant piece of performance art, very lovingly capturing the idiosyncratic pathos of anything involving Werner’s esoteric perspective and iconic vocals:

“We search for Waldo, but what is Waldo searching for? In searching for Waldo, did we really find ourselves? No. Probably not.”

Despite the endless memes and clips of “Sad beige clothing/toys for sad beige children” streaming around, I am still convinced that Werner has a niche fandom. Francois Truffaut’s stance that Werner is “the most important film director alive” notwithstanding, most people on the street could not name a single one of his films. Probably the progenitors of these popular hot takes have only seen Grizzly Man (2005) or that viral clip of the discombobulated penguin from Encounters at the End of the World (2007). Even more likely, they saw his tiny but memorable roles in The Mandalorian or Jack Reacher (2016) and were simply intrigued by his deadpan menace.

But do they recall that time when Werner rescued Joaquin Phoenix from his totaled car? Did they thank the Universe Werner did not die from that gunshot he received during the taping of an interview? Do they know that Even Dwarfs Started Small (1970) is one of David Lynch’s top three favorite films of all time? Did they watch Werner stew and eat his own shoe when he lost a bet with Errol Morris?

“Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe” (1980), dir. Les Blank

The shoe thing boils down (pun intended) why I respect Werner so much, and subsequently roll my eyes at numerous assumptions that he is unhinged. He is one of the most sane people alive. He is an artist of incredible integrity, and takes his craft as seriously as humanly possible. That is why he ate the shoe—to bring attention to the do-or-die spirit of independent filmmaking.

Werner is not nearly as dour or lugubrious as the popular persona propagated by social media would have you believe. Listening to Werner’s chat with our beloved Conan O’Brien on his eponymous podcast, I am reminded of how cheerful he truly is. Lena, his wife of twenty-five years, describes him as a “mild-mannered fluffy husband,” and I find that as believable as it is adorable.

Sure, he has proposed holy war against TV commercials, is suspicious of yoga classes for five-year-olds (who isn’t?), and tends to mount film projects with the darkest of subjects that happen to be infinitely quotable, but he is not an indolent emo pessimist. He is a realist, a pragmatist, and well-adjusted to the chaos of the world. He is a true poet who tries not to avert his eyes from what disturbs him, and in so doing, picks out the beauty hidden in the abyss. He is disciplined and centered, a steady hand and heart surrounded by the madness of the improbable experience that is living. We should all aspire to be as authentic, empathetic, and open to inspiration as he is.

One of my favorite films he ever did was La Soufrière (1977). When Werner heard that a volcano was about to explode on the island of Guadeloupe, and that there was this one stubborn person who refused to evacuate, he jumped on a plane with a skeleton film crew to seek him out. He found the man, and a few others, and documented their nonchalance about the burning mountain and resignation toward life’s travails. Luckily, the volcano did not blow its top, sparing the town, the few hold-outs, and a young, audacious filmmaker who went on to risk his life for so many other wild adventures in the following decades to come, all in the service of showcasing “ecstatic truth.” If Werner did not go to that island, did not have the character and fortitude he has learned to inculcate in himself, we would not be doing reductive impressions of him now.  

Handsome AF

Werner has made a career out of challenging us to question the allegedly inherent value of “mere facts.” As stated in his “Minnesota Declaration” in 1999, Werner testifies:

 

“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.”

 

Werner equates Cinema Verité with tourism—a sin, in his eyes—as compared to travel on foot, which is a virtue. His style of filmmaking is definitively the latter, to the chagrin of documentarists who strive for objectivity at every turn. His greater point is that there is no true objectivity—that itself is an illusion, its own fabrication—so one may as well get over it.

But not everybody can do what he does. Not every filmmaker has his capacity for this level of intellectual honesty about their art. His contract with his audience is not a promise to present the truth. It is a promise that he will never stop looking for it, especially if it is impossible.

I salute you, Werner, for whatever steamship you are dragging over a mountain this week. 

 

I love that dumb dumb bird