Aguirre the Wrath of God

(written 8/23/2007, 10:51)

2nd time. The first time I saw this was on my 25th birthday, and I wrote a poem out of it. At the time, it was maybe the second or third Herzog movie I'd seen, and I was still trying to figure him out. I definitely had not decided he does things in his films that are completely different from the way most movies work, and seem in some ways more related to poetry than to novels. Although generally there's still an overall narrative around them, I'm referring mostly to isolated scenes in Herzog movies, whose power is not at all taken from the narrative of the movie, but are just perfect images or bits of film or whatever exactly you call them...

Before the movie, they ran a preview for "Le Doulos," during which some annoying guy behind me clapped loudly when the name of the lead actor (who was also the lead in Breathless) was shown. Same guy clapped really loudly when the words "Directed by Werner Herzog" were on screen. Yeah, I get it, you've seen Breathless... you know who Werner Herzog is (although, really, why the hell would be be attending a double feature of Herzog movies if you didn't at least know who he is?)... Shut up!

The movie definitely seemed a lot slower the first time I saw it. I was surprised to find out this time that it's actually only slightly under two hours long. It felt far tighter, this time. Also, definitely a different translation, which confused me at first, because the first line of my poem, "In the morning I read mass, then we descended through the mountain pass," was taken from the subtitles, and this time it was translated as "In the morning I read mass, then we descended through the clouds." Frankly, I like the second translation better, but no idea if it's more accurate or anything.

I had this distinct memory of Klaus Kinski hunching his way across the screen, and in the middle of his crossing turning his face out toward the camera so his blue eyes shone, but that never happened. I must have invented it. It would've been a cool shot, though, in a very Herzogian way.

I still think one of the most interesting things about this movie is how I feel just much fear (not exactly fear, but some kind of anxiety) for the actors on the rafts as I do for the characters, if not more. This doesn't seem like a mistake on Herzog's part, but rather kind of the point. You just can't fully surrender yourself to the idea that these are sixteenth or seventeenth century soldiers because it's obvious that the people on the rafts really seem to be in danger, and because they danger seems real and not "real," we direct our anxiety to the actors and film crews instead of the characters and their situations. The only other examples of this I can think of come from Herzog movies, for the most part. Although it's exactly what I found so amazing about the car chase scene in Tarrantino's half of Grindhouse: the whole part when the stunt-chick's on the hood of the car, she appears to be in real actual danger as a person not just as a character, which makes the whole thing so much more thrilling, or actually thrilling in a completely different way, than even the most exceptionally choreographed action/chase/stunt scene in most films. We never really worry about Matt Damon in The Bourne Ultimatum; we only worry about Jason Bourne. Is it ethically okay for Herzog to do this? I certainly would not want to appear in one of his movies.

There are so many incredible scenes in this movie. The horse scene. Aguirre chasing the monkeys around the dying raft. The tiny jungle creature baby (a sloth?) The boat in the tree. (Did Herzog plan the boat in the tree, or did he find it? Either way, it's a supremely poetic shot.)

Also one of the few Herzog films where I think the dialogue lives up the movie Herzog has shot around it.

I really had not been expecting this movie to be as good as it was before I watched it the second time. Right now, I'm practically vibrating with how great this movie is. Absolutely worthy of that word. I think I had a hint of that after watching it the first time, but it was a little bit outside at the time of my realm of understanding of movies.