FilmClick

The trend toward digital cinema may have left the seventies far behind, but there must still be some of you out there who remember when 16mm film was among the most accessible formats. Before the Handicam, the onboard shotgun microphone, and non-linear, OS-based editing software, documentary filmmakers had to actually light their subjects’ spaces, sound recordists had to carry reel-to-reel tape recorders, and tens of thousands of feet of film had to be exposed, developed, printed, and spliced together on electric flatbed machines.

Thanks to the versatility of small-format 8mm and 16mm film stocks, low budget and independent films were still achievable. And if it still sounds like a work-intensive process, just take a look at the results at Film Forum this week.

Always for Pleasure (1978)

Documentary filmmaker Les Blank’s legendary body of work is on display at one of Manhattan’s premier independent theaters, located at 209 West Houston Street, and what a body of work it is. The director and his collaborator Maureen Gosling, in a tireless pursuit of rare, beautiful, and otherwise interesting subjects (spanning some four decades and still going strong), have compiled several dozen films, both short and feature length, on topics ranging from the love of garlic to women with dental eccentricities to Latin music traditions in the American southwest. A soft-spoken Blank and the more assertive Gosling will be appearing for several question and answer sessions throughout the week’s programs.

Blank and Werner Herzog

His footage alone is historic. Whether tracking Werner Herzog through the rainforest of the Amazon basin (1982’s Burden of Dreams earned a prestigious Criterion Collection release), exploring drumming and rumba traditions in Cuba, or making enemies in dance halls throughout the deep South for imposing his modest lighting scenario, the results are never anything short of breathtaking. Blank’s camera lyrically shifts focus, poignantly zooms in and out, and takes advantage of all the beautiful soft edges and soft contrast that 16mm has to offer.

Sworn to the Drum: A Tribute (1995)

What has emerged, and will continue to emerge, from the countless hours of this process-intensive filmmaking are a cache of poetic and resonant stories about love, music, good food, and the passion that drives our human culture.

By Michael Prall, FilmClick staff, mprall@filmclick.com

Greenwich Village’s IFC Center helped keep the scare alive during my post-Halloween weekend. The indie theater boasts a new 35mm print of Werner Herzog’s classic genre subversion, Nosferatu the Vampyre. IFC consistently includes retrospective programs, classic and rare films that augment an already impressive lineup of new and independent work.

Nosferatu the Vampyre

Nosferatu may not necessarily be among Herzog’s best films, but it’s certainly among the most memorable. It stars a terrifying Klaus Kinski as Dracula, the Romanian vampire of legend, brought to life in Bram Stoker’s immortal tale. In a strange combination of the classic German expressionist style, in particular the original 1922 Nosferatu by F. W. Murnau, contemporary (1970’s) industry horror movies (the dialogue is recorded in English, even), and Herzog’s tendency to inject a profound weirdness into his themes, the film becomes far more complex as it moves along.

By the end, we’re treated to some typical Herzog subversion, as the city is stricken with rats, and the plague they carry with them. Citizens in their final hours dance around the anarchic town square in glee, at one with death and decay. Also of note is Kinski’s natural ease with the role of Dracula. He seems to have been born for this role. The piercing stare and ethereal stillness that characterize many of his Herzog roles in this case come off as truly horrifying.

By Michael Prall, FilmClick staff, mprall@filmclick.com

Encounters at the End of the World
Werner Herzog
July 22, 2008

I couldn’t resist doing a quick review of filmmaker Werner Herzog’s Encounters at the End of the World, which I finally managed to see over the weekend.  Although it has a wider scale distribution than most of the films and festivals we review here, Herzog is an old favorite, a true independent, and a wonderful filmmaker.  Herzog blithely declares that he sets out to make a film solely inspired by some images of an underwater dive which were shot under the ice near the south pole by his friend Henry Kaiser.  He finds in Antarctica a group of unique people who’ve found their way to the end of the earth in a variety of interesting ways.  Herzog gives a picture of the initiation and life at McMurdo Base, meeting biologists, truck drivers, physicists, mechanics, volcanologists, and plumbers with equal enthusiasm.  

The biologists he engages are studying the life that exists in extreme conditions under the ice and the implications of these creatures on the origins of life itself.  Other scientists study neutrinos, the earth’s crust, and the continent’s land animals and birds.  Herzog brings life to each subject, even asking one particularly gruff penguin expert about penguin homosexuality and insanity.  He becomes fascinated by a penguin who walks away from the colony and not out to sea, but toward the inner landscape of Antarctica. The penguin won’t come back, according to researchers, although it faces certain death. It is determined to go inland and the scientists are honor bound not to interfere. 

In this film, Herzog clearly finds the people as interesting as the place.  There’s one man who carries an escape bag with inflatable canoe at all times, a plumber descended from Incan royalty, musician scientists, and many predictions of the end of the human race.  Mixed in with all of this humanity is the majesty, comedy, and harshness of the setting.  The underwater dive is coupled with almost religious music and you can feel the reverence that Herzog has for the uniqueness of the experiences he is having.  It may be at the end of the world, but it often seems like a different world entirely, populated by a different kind of human.  Definitely worth seeing.

by Christopher Potter, FilmClick Staff, cpotter@filmclick.com