Werner Herzog: the filmmaker as athlete
Ort: Toronto
Ereignis: Werner Herzog präsentiert als Weltpremiere seinen Film „Wheel of Time“ beim Hot Docs Festival Toronto, unterstützt durch das Goethe-Institut Toronto.
Werner Herzog was a fearless guest star at this year’s Toronto Hot Docs Festival, presenting his latest film “Wheel of Time” in April, during a SARS related “advisory” warning by the World Health Organisation. (…)
How does a self-proclaimed athlete filmmaker translate the essence of spirituality, of the ethereal mandala into film? How does a Western filmmaker, who says of himself that he is never detached, work in a culture where attachment is regarded to be the root of suffering? POV wanted to know the answer to these and a myriad of other questions. Herzog didn’t disappoint us. He proved to be as open and baffling, as contentious and engaging as his reputation has made him out to be. (…)
Jutta Brendemühl: A lot of your work seems infused by the mythical, transcendental. Do you have some sort of metaphysical set of beliefs that comes to work in your films?
Werner Herzog: No.
JB: Are you detached from these questions, even in a film like “Wheel of Time”?
WH: No, I’m physical, not really metaphysical. I’m an athlete, or I used to be an athlete.
JB: …thus also the fascination with the mountains… Related to that I wanted to ask you about the cross-cultural experience. You were there as a Western filmmaker and you approach these people that, in a way, live in a different universe. Where are you between closeness and detachment when you do these kinds of projects with very different cultures?
WH: I’m never detached, I’m always --and this is a very good example-- very, very close, and I’m physically curious and you see how the camera immerses itself in the mayhem of crowds of pilgrims struggling over some consecrated dumplings, for example, for the long life ceremony. Anyone else would have shot it from a tripod, from some distance with a long lens. Whenever there was mayhem and piling up of scrambling pilgrims and broken bones (there were literally severely injured people on the ground), the camera always sticks right into it, physically. And it only does so because I’m so curious and I’m not detached. I’m not distant. I want to go to the very centre of the mayhem.
JB: In one shot, there's the cameraman’s thumb in the picture…
WH: That’s the cinematographer's. Yes, I left it in because some fragment of one of these dumplings flew right at the lens and you see the thumb of the cinematographer, clearing the lens. But he keeps on filming. There’s a certain bravado (laughs).
(...)
Ereignis: Werner Herzog präsentiert als Weltpremiere seinen Film „Wheel of Time“ beim Hot Docs Festival Toronto, unterstützt durch das Goethe-Institut Toronto.
Werner Herzog was a fearless guest star at this year’s Toronto Hot Docs Festival, presenting his latest film “Wheel of Time” in April, during a SARS related “advisory” warning by the World Health Organisation. (…)
How does a self-proclaimed athlete filmmaker translate the essence of spirituality, of the ethereal mandala into film? How does a Western filmmaker, who says of himself that he is never detached, work in a culture where attachment is regarded to be the root of suffering? POV wanted to know the answer to these and a myriad of other questions. Herzog didn’t disappoint us. He proved to be as open and baffling, as contentious and engaging as his reputation has made him out to be. (…)
Jutta Brendemühl: A lot of your work seems infused by the mythical, transcendental. Do you have some sort of metaphysical set of beliefs that comes to work in your films?
Werner Herzog: No.
JB: Are you detached from these questions, even in a film like “Wheel of Time”?
WH: No, I’m physical, not really metaphysical. I’m an athlete, or I used to be an athlete.
JB: …thus also the fascination with the mountains… Related to that I wanted to ask you about the cross-cultural experience. You were there as a Western filmmaker and you approach these people that, in a way, live in a different universe. Where are you between closeness and detachment when you do these kinds of projects with very different cultures?
WH: I’m never detached, I’m always --and this is a very good example-- very, very close, and I’m physically curious and you see how the camera immerses itself in the mayhem of crowds of pilgrims struggling over some consecrated dumplings, for example, for the long life ceremony. Anyone else would have shot it from a tripod, from some distance with a long lens. Whenever there was mayhem and piling up of scrambling pilgrims and broken bones (there were literally severely injured people on the ground), the camera always sticks right into it, physically. And it only does so because I’m so curious and I’m not detached. I’m not distant. I want to go to the very centre of the mayhem.
JB: In one shot, there's the cameraman’s thumb in the picture…
WH: That’s the cinematographer's. Yes, I left it in because some fragment of one of these dumplings flew right at the lens and you see the thumb of the cinematographer, clearing the lens. But he keeps on filming. There’s a certain bravado (laughs).
(...)
von Jutta Brendemühl (Goethe-Institut Toronto), Point of View, Winter 2003/4
