GREAT ECSTASY OF THE SCULPTOR STEINER / HOW MUCH WOOD WOULD A WOODCHUCK CHUCK? / LA SOUFRIERE - DVD review

Some documentaries set out make the unfamiliar familiar; others to defamiliarize the familiar. In his documentaries, Werner Herzog transforms both the familiar and the unfamiliar into the sublime.

In the 1970s, Herzog gained fame as one of the leading lights of New German Cinema. He was best known for his work with Klaus Kinski in "Aguirre: the Wrath of God" (1973) or with the elusive Bruno S. in "The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser" (1974). Critics and cinephiles were only peripherally aware, if at all, of the fact that Herzog was also a documentarian despite the fact that he shot more documentaries than fiction films during the 70s.

It's not hard to understand why. Aside from the feature-length "Land of Silence and Darkness" (1969) and "Fata Morgana" (1970), Herzog's documentaries were all short film (usually 45 minutes) funded by German television. Needless to say, short documentaries aren't an easy sell in the marketplace, and only a handful of festival goers in America ever had the opportunity to see them on the big screen. The problem grew even worse in the 80s and 90s when Herzog worked almost exclusively in the short documentary form. Critics wondered if Herzog was still making films when, in fact, he was as prolific as ever.

Short documentaries still don't get theatrical releases, but DVDs have rushed to the rescue. The success of the DVD format has enabled studios to release many types of films which would never receive traditional distribution: animation, TV shows, avant-garde films and, yes, even short documentaries. DVDs fill a gaping void left by Hollywood's domination of theatrical distribution channels.

The three films included in "Short Films by Werner Herzog" were all made in the mid-1970s, arguably Herzog's peak period. The films demonstrate different facets of one of the most unusual and innovative careers in the annals of documentary filmmaking.


THE GREAT ECSTASY OF THE SCULPTOR STEINER (1974)

Some pundits mistakenly believe that the goal of a documentary is to reproduce reality. Herzog, like the best non-fiction filmmakers, understands that a documentary should transform reality in order to present it in a manner the viewer never previously considered. Herzog does not merely report on the events he depicts, he interprets them and presents them in a manner that only he can.

At first blush, "The Great Ecstasy of Sculptor Steiner" appears to be a simple sports film. Walter Steiner is a wood carver by trade, but moonlights as the world's greatest ski-flier. Apparently, ski-flying differs from ski-jumping by the sheer distance the skiers travel, and nobody can fly further than Walter Steiner. Steiner is so good that the best ski-fliers in the world don't bother to show up to competitions when they know he will be there. He is so good, in fact, that he has to start his jumps lower on the ramp than everybody else out of the very real fear that he will fly clear over the course and beyond any reasonable safety zone. On one jump, he flies so far that he is unable to land cleanly and winds up with a badly bloodied face that almost knocks him out of the competition in Planica, Yugoslavia (now Slovenia).

Herzog appears on screen holding a microphone and breathlessly recounts Steiner's exploits. He battles sports reporters from across the globe (including ABC) to get the champion's attention. But Herzog has something more in mind than a mere sports film. Using high-speed cameras that can slow down the footage to 1/20th normal speed, Herzog enables us to see Steiner in a way nobody has ever seen him before. Seemingly suspended in time, Steiner flies ever so slowly through the air, his mouth open wide (in horror? in ecstasy?) as he leans his body forward so far he is practically parallel to the ground. With the snow and the blinding sun, the image becomes so distorted and blurred it is barely recognizable as anything more than shape, line and motion. I don't think any filmmaker has ever used slow motion to such great effect. With the use of a moody electronic soundtrack by Popul Vuh (a frequent contributor to his films), Herzog manages to rip the image clear away from its mooring in reality. It is otherworldly. Steiner becomes more than just an athlete; he becomes a transcendent figure, and a "mere" sports film becomes a mystical experience.

The final image of the film is one of the most memorable I have ever seen. In super-slow motion (with Popul Vuh still cranking) Steiner sticks a textbook landing and then keeps skiing. Eventually he becomes nothing more than a black line that almost disappears into the blurred white snowy background. Herzog holds the image so long, it becomes unrecognizable. Steiner could be flying, he could be walking, or he could be sailing across the ocean.

"The Great Ecstasy of Sculptor Steiner" is an achingly beautiful film, and I consider it the greatest of all short documentaries, and one of the greatest short films of any kind.

HOW MUCH WOOD WOULD A WOODCHUCK CHUCK? (1976)

"Steiner" was a film about images; "Woodchuck" is a film about words.

Herzog and his crew head to Pennsylvania Dutch Country to film the 1976 World Livestock Auctioneer Championship. Herzog turns his attention on the Pennsylvania Dutch who are, of course, descended from German immigrants (Dutch should actually be Deutsch as in German). Despite their common heritage, Herzog is amazed to discover that he cannot understand a single word of their dialect; in just a few hundred years, their language, originally German, has mutated beyond recognition.

After his dalliance with the locals, Herzog focuses on the competition. The cattle auctioneers speak in a machine-gun quick patter that is not just a language, but also a kind of performance art. Herzog is known for his highly manipulated documentaries, but here he simply turns on the camera and lets it run as one auctioneer after another steps up the microphone. For more than twenty minutes, we see and hear nothing but a series of auctioneers snapping off bids and sell off the cattle who mill about the stockyard. The audio experience is so overwhelming that it soon begins to sound more like music than any kind of language. You could say that "Woodchuck" is one of the most eccentric concert films of all time.

I have seen the German version of this film before. It's a difficult viewing experience because the English audio is accompanied by a German translation which is then supported with English subtitles; talk about cognitive dissonance! The German voice-over is completely absent here which makes for a more smoother sailing, but also robs the film of some of its profundity. In the German version, Herzog explains that he considers cattle auctioneering to be the "poetry of capitalism." I find that a lovely thought, and it is sorely missed in this English-only version.

You will either be mesmerized by the endless auctioneering scenes or bored. I think it's pretty darned amazing, and it improves with each viewing. It is also a truly great film to watch when you are stone drunk.

LA SOUFRIÈRE (1977)

"La Soufrière" features Herzog's more playful, self-effacing side. The first clue to the impending joke is in the opening sequence when the title "La Soufrière" is followed by the subtitle "Waiting for an Inevitable Catastrophe."

The titular volcano, located on the island of Guadeloupe, has billowed toxic fumes for days, and rattling the surrounding villages. Scientists are certain it will erupt any time now, and local authorities order the villagers to evacuate the area. Naturally, Herzog decides the most logical thing to do is fly to the island to film it all.

The beginning is genuinely eerie. Herzog and his two man crew (cameramen Jörg Schmidt-Reitwein and Ed Lachman) arrive in a deserted town. The residents left so quickly, they did not even turn off their television sets. Only a few starving animals walk the streets. Far more ominous than this Twilight Zone town, though, is the rumbling menace only a few miles away. The volcano belches forth massive clouds of smoke that almost obscure the sun. Herzog, of course, wants to take a closer look. The crew begins to climb the mountain, but soon has to retreat when the wind shifts and blows a black cloud of toxic gas right at them. Ed Lachman loses his glasses. Herzog promises him they will go back and find them as long as the mountain still exists tomorrow.

After the crew exercises the better part of valor on La Soufrière, they speak to a few hearty locals who ignored the evacuation orders. One man is simply resigned to his fate: "I am too poor; where would I go?" Another man claims he is unafraid: "We all die some day" but he still asks the crew if they will take him when they leave.

Alas, Herzog has no intention of leaving until the very last minutes before the eruption. He wants to film the final moments of this island before it is buried under ash forever. So they wait, and they wait, and they wait… and nothing happens. The volcano settles down. The villagers return to their homes, and life returns to normal.

Herzog appreciates the irony of the situation: "There was something pathetic in the shooting of this picture for us, and therefore it ended a little bit embarrassing. Now it has become a report on an inevitable catastrophe that did not take place." The catastrophe did not take place, yet the film he made about it is still a compelling one. The lesson here is that a documentarian can still fashion his own story out of the raw fabric of reality even when events don't play out as anticipated. Herzog captures some sublimely beautiful shots of the volcano in all its glory, and salvages the anti-climax by hitting us with a big, booming dose of Wagner over the final lingering shot of the disaster that never was.


Video

The films are presented in their original 1.33:1 full-screen aspect ratio. Remember these were all shot for German television. Unfortunately, this is not a restored transfer, so the image quality is somewhat washed out, and the flaws and debris from the original source material are still visible. Still, the quality is acceptable, if not inspiring.

Audio

The DVD is presented in Dolby Digital Mono. The Popul Vuh music on "Steiner" is well-mixed, but the Wagner number at the end of "La Soufriere" is dialed down far too low. Optional English subtitles support the German audio in "Steiner." The other two films are in English and do not have subtitles.

Extras

None. Bummer. I would have loved a Herzog commentary track on these films.

Closing Thoughts

Three short documentaries. No extras. Not even a restored transfer. Yet I have no qualms in stating that "Short Films by Werner Herzog" is one of the most exciting and important DVD releases of 2005. All three films deserve a central place in Herzog's oeuvre, but have previously been available only on a bootleg tape occasionally sold on eBay. It's no coincidence that awareness of Herzog's stature as a documentarian has grown immensely in the DVD era. Releases such as this one remind us of how diverse and vital Herzog's work truly is.