Precautions Against Fanatics

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Precautions Against Fanatics

Directed by	Werner Herzog
Produced by	Werner Herzog
Written by	Werner Herzog
Cinematography	Dieter Lohmann Jörg Schmidt-Reitwein
Editing by	Beate Mainka-Jellinghaus
Release date(s)	1969
Running time	12 min.
Country	West Germany
Language	German
IMDb profile

Precautions Against Fanatics (German: Massnahmen gegen Fanatiker) is a short film by Werner Herzog filmed at a harness racing track near Munich, Germany.^[1] It was Herzog's first film shot in color.^[1]

The film features several horse trainers and other track workers talking about their roles at the track, always eventually interrupted by an older man who claims to be the true authority, and demands that they be thrown out. One recurring young man, the first to appear, claims that he protects the horses from enthusiastic racing fans. He does not appear to be employed by the track, but seems to provide his services voluntarily. His protection from "fanatics" gives the film its title. Also featured is a man who trains the horses by walking them around a tree for 36 hours at a time, and a man whose job is "doping" the horses with garlic before races. The film ends with the young man who protects against fanatics seated at a zoo. He says that the track officials asked him to leave, and now he protects the zoo's flamingos from fanatics.

The film is shot in a documentary style, but the sheer implausibility of the dialogue leaves the exact nature of the film ambiguous. The director states that the film is intended to be humorous^[1], and Herzog's official website describes the film as an "Elaborate on-camera practical joke."^[2]

[edit] References

^ ^a ^b ^c Herzog, Werner (2001). Herzog on Herzog. Faber and Faber. ISBN 0-571-20708-1.
^ Werner Herzog.com official film description

v • d • e Films directed by Werner Herzog

1960s	Herakles (1962) • Game in the Sand (1964) • The Unprecedented Defence of the Fortress Deutschkreuz (1967) • Last Words (1967) • Signs of Life (1968) • The Flying Doctors of East Africa (1969) Precautions Against Fanatics (1969)

1970s	Even Dwarfs Started Small (1970) • Handicapped Future (1971) • Land of Silence and Darkness (1971) • Fata Morgana (1971) • Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972) • The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner (1974) • The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (1974) • Heart of Glass (1976) • No One Will Play With Me (1976) • How Much Wood Would a Woodchuck Chuck (1976) • Stroszek (1977) • La Soufrière (1977) • Nosferatu the Vampyre (1978) • Woyzeck (1978)

1980s	Huie's Sermon (1981) • God's Angry Man (1981) • Fitzcarraldo (1982) • Ballad of the Little Soldier (1984) • The Dark Glow of the Mountains (1984) • Where the Green Ants Dream (1984) • Portrait Werner Herzog (1986) • Cobra Verde (1987) • The French as seen by... (1988) • Wodaabe - Herdsmen of the Sun (1989)

1990s	Film Lesson 1-4 (1990) • Echoes From a Somber Empire (1990) • Jag Mandir (1991) • Scream of Stone (1991) • Lessons of Darkness (1992) • Bells from the Deep (1993) • The Transformation of the World Into Music (1994) • Gesualdo: Death for Five Voices (1995) • Little Dieter Needs to Fly (1997) • The Lord and the Laden (1999) • My Best Fiend (1999)

2000s	Wings of Hope (2000) • Invincible (2001) • Pilgrimage (2001) • Ten Minutes Older (2002) • Wheel of Time (2003) • The White Diamond (2004) • Grizzly Man (2005) • The Wild Blue Yonder (2005) • Rescue Dawn (2007) • Encounters at the End of the World (2007) • The Cheese and the Worms (2008)