An extraordinary portrait of Walter Steiner, the former world champion ski jumper. The film centres around Steiner’s participation in the large hill competition of the Ski Jumping World Championship in Planica, Slovenia, in March 1974.

When it comes to ski jumping, THE GREAT ECSTASY OF WOODCARVER STEINER is already a historical document: this sport has undergone rapid development in the intervening years. The ski jumpers compete without crash helmets, and the ski boots and bindings would no doubt fall short of today’s safety standards. Back then, ski jumpers had to leap onto the in-run from the side, whereas nowadays, they simply push themselves off from a starting bar. At the time, the ski jumping world record was 169 metres; in 2009 this stands at 239 metres. While in Steiner's day it was customary to keep the skis parallel during a jump, today skiers splay their skies as per the aerodynamically more efficient “V-style”.

This film, however, is not about ski jumping technique, equipment or the condition of the hill. It is about one of the cardinal themes in Herzog’s work: the yearning for weightlessness and its fleeting fulfilment, the desire to overcome physical limitations and lift up off the ground; naturally, all of this is inexorably bound up with defeat, with plummeting and crashing. These are ancient themes that date back to the Greek myth of Icarus and Daedalus.

Right from the start, Herzog uses extreme slow-motion cameras to heighten the illusion of weightless flight, a technique which also evokes a sensation of blissful harmony. A little later, however, the filmmaker assembles a sequence of crashes so horrific that it is hard to believe the athletes neither lost their lives nor suffered lifelong disabilities as a consequence of their bravura. Herzog admires the courageous; hubris attracts him far more than humility. There’s a metaphysical aspect behind his protagonists’ physical feats, where the desire to overcome limits also extends into the abstract.

THE GREAT ECSTASY OF WOODCARVER STEINER was made as part of a television series called “Grenzstationen” (“Border Stations”) which followed people in extreme situations: a theme seemingly tailor-made for Herzog. One of the series’ stipulations was that the ‘narrator’ personally appear in front of the camera, in the manner of an eye-witness, in order to create a greater impression of authenticity. This results in the unusually frequent appearance of the filmmaker in front of the camera, reporting in the style of a journalist, rather than just delivering an off-screen commentary.

Werner Herzog once revealed that he too had dreamt of becoming a renowned ski jumper. Perhaps this unfulfilled ambition is the reason why he reacts with such enthusiasm to the Swiss Walter Steiner’s supreme sporting performances, and barely mentions his other great talent for sculpting. The film leaves very little room for Steiner's artistic expression and capabilities. Herzog prefers to focus on moments of monumental drama. When Steiner takes a bad fall on his second practice jump, the film director shows concern not only for his protagonist but also for his film, so unsure is he as to whether the ski jumper will still be able to participate in the competition in Planica.

When Steiner talks, it always sounds a little as though Herzog had written the text for him. “It feels as though I’m in a stadium, with 50,000 onlookers just waiting for me to crash out!” The real reason behind his misgivings is his superiority. Steiner feels under pressure from the organisers since, even when he opts for a shorter run-up so as to lift off from the jump-off platform at a lower speed, he cannot help but fly further than his rivals. On his penultimate jump, Steiner clears a distance of 166 metres and is awarded 20 points, the perfect score, by many of the judges. Herzog raves of this being the “most perfect jump of all time.” The Swiss ski jumper wins the competition, despite having voluntarily chosen to handicap himself for the benefit of his competitors.

Steiner afterwards tells the story of a young raven that he had raised as a boy and which would even come to meet him after school. It lost its feathers however, perhaps as a result of eating the wrong feed, and was tormented so cruelly by its peers that Steiner was left with no choice other than to shoot it. This anecdote, relating as it does to flying, flightlessness and falling, could just as easily have been improvised by Herzog; as could the irritatingly egocentric and deliberately epic closing quote which the film maker places at the end: “I should be all alone in this world; I, Steiner, and no other living creature. No sun, no culture; just me, naked, on a high cliff; no storms, no snow, no roads, no banks, no money, no time and no breath. At least then I wouldn't be afraid anymore.”

PS: Walter Steiner has since married and lives in the Swedish town of Falun, where he has taken up the less dangerous hobby of fly fishing. This was of no interest to Herzog.

Production Country

Germany (DE)

Production Period

1973/1974

Production Year

1974

color

color

Aspect Ratio

1:1,37

Duration

Medium-Length Film (31 to 60 Min.)

Type

Documentary

Genre

Biography / Portrait

Topic

Sport, Film History

Available Media

DVD, DCP, Blu-ray Disc

Original Version

German (de)

DVD

Subtitles

English (en), Spanish (es), French (fr), Italian (it), Portuguese (Brazil) (pt), Russian (ru), Chinese (zh), Arabic (ar), German (de), Turkish (tr)

DCP

Subtitles

German (de), German (partly), English (en), French (fr), Spanish (Latin America), Portuguese (Brazil), Arabic (ar), Chinese (zh), Russian (ru), Italian (it), Turkish (tr)

Note on the Format

Verschlüsselte DCP

Blu-ray Disc

Subtitles

German (de), German (partly), English (en), French (fr), Spanish (Latin America), Portuguese (Brazil), Arabic (ar), Chinese (zh), Russian (ru), Italian (it), Turkish (tr)