Werner Herzog

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Werner Herzog

Werner Herzog at Ebertfest 2007.
Born Werner Stipetić
September 5, 1942 (1942-09-05) (age 65)
Munich, Germany
Years active 1962–present
Spouse(s) Martje Grohmann,
Christine Maria Ebenberger,
Lena Pisetski (1999–)

Werner Herzog (born Werner Stipetić on September 5, 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, actor, and opera director.

He is often associated with the German New Wave movement (also called New German Cinema), along with Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Margarethe von Trotta, Volker Schlöndorff, Wim Wenders and others. His films often feature heroes with impossible dreams or people with unique talents in obscure fields.

Contents

[edit] Early life and family

Herzog was born Werner Stipetić (pronounced [stɪpɛtɪtʃ]) in Munich. He adopted his father's name Herzog, which means "duke" in German, when his father returned from a prisoner of war camp after World War II.[1][2] His family moved to a remote village in Austria after the house next to theirs was destroyed during the bombing at the close of World War II.[2] When he was 12, he and his family moved back to Munich and shared an apartment with Klaus Kinski in Elisabethstraße in Munich-Schwabing. About this, Herzog recalled, "I knew at that moment that I would be a film director and that I would direct Kinski".

The same year, Herzog was told to sing in front of his class at school and he adamantly refused. He was almost expelled for this and until the age of 18 listened to no music, sang no songs and studied no instruments. He later said that he would easily give 10 years from his life to be able to play an instrument. At 14 he was inspired by an encyclopedia entry about film-making which he says provided him with "everything I needed to get myself started" as a film-maker - that, and the 35 mm camera that the young Herzog stole from the Munich Film School.[1] He studied at the University of Munich despite earning a scholarship to Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He supposedly dropped out in a matter of days and made his way to Mexico where he worked in a rodeo.[citation needed]

In the early 1960s Herzog worked night shifts as a welder in a steel factory to help fund his first films.

Herzog has been married three times and has had three children. In 1967, Herzog married Martje Grohmann, with whom he had a son in 1973, Rudolph Amos Achmed. In 1980 his daughter Hanna Mattes was born to Eva Mattes. In 1987, Herzog married Christine Maria Ebenberger. Their son, Simon David Alexander Herzog, was born in 1989. In 1999 he married Lena Pisetski. They now live in Los Angeles.

[edit] Films and criticism

Herzog's films have received considerable critical acclaim and achieved popularity on the art house circuit. They have also been the subject of controversy in regard to their themes and messages, especially the circumstances surrounding their creation. A notable example is Fitzcarraldo, in which the obsessiveness of the central character was mirrored by the director during the making of the film. His treatment of subjects has been characterized as Wagnerian in its scope, as Fitzcarraldo and his later film Invincible (2001) are directly inspired by opera, or operatic themes. He is proud of never using storyboards and often improvising large parts of the script, as he explains on the commentary track to Aguirre, The Wrath of God.

One theme running through Herzog's films are Chickens, which Herzog fears. They appear in:[3]

  • Game in the Sand centers around a chicken
  • Signs of Life features a chicken buried up to its neck in a mound of sand
  • Signs of Life and The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser feature chicken hypnosis
  • Aguirre, The Wrath of God the chickens are thrown over a cliff in the open section
  • Even Dwarfs Started Small features cannibalistic chickens, and several sequences of dwarfs throwing chickens
  • Stroszek ends with a long shot of a dancing chicken
  • Invincible features a tale about a man who thinks himself to be a rooster
  • The White Diamond features a Guyanese man who adores his pet rooster and wishes to bring it up with him when offered a ride on an airship

[edit] Actors

Besides uses movie stars, German, American and otherwise, Herzog is known for using people from the locality in which he is shooting. Especially in his "documentaries", he uses locals to benefit his, as he calls it, "elastic truth", using footage of them both playing parts and being themselves.

Herzog has a small list of actors who regularly appear in his films. He directed five films starring Klaus Kinski: Aguirre, The Wrath of God, Nosferatu, Woyzeck, Fitzcarraldo, and Cobra Verde. In 1999 he directed and narrated the documentary film My Best Fiend, a retrospective on his often rocky relationship with Kinski.

Actors who appear repeatedly in Herzog films are:

[edit] Awards

Herzog and his films have won and been nominated for many awards over the years. Most notably, Herzog won the best director award for Fitzcarraldo at the 1982 Cannes Film Festival.

Grizzly Man, directed by Herzog, won the Alfred P. Sloan Prize at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival

Herzog was honored at the 49th San Francisco International Film Festival, receiving the 2006 Film Society Directing Award. Four of his films have been shown at the San Francisco International Film Festival throughout the years: Herdsmen of the Sun in 1990, Bells from the Deep in 1993, Lessons of Darkness in 1993, and Wild Blue Yonder in 2006. Herzog's April of 2007 appearance at the Ebertfest in Champaign, IL earned him the Golden Thumb Award, and an engraved glockenspiel given to him by a young film maker inspired by his films.

[edit] Filmography

[edit] Films

  1. Herakles (1962)
  2. Game in The Sand (1964)
  3. Last Words (1967)
  4. The Unprecedented Defence of the Fortress Deutschkreuz (1967)
  5. Signs of Life (1968)
  6. Precautions Against Fanatics (1969)
  7. Even Dwarfs Started Small (1970)
  8. Land of Silence and Darkness (1971)
  9. Fata Morgana (1971)
  10. Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972)
  11. The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner (1974)
  12. The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (1974)
  13. How much Wood Would a Woodchuck Chuck (1976)
  14. No One Will Play With Me (1976)
  15. Heart of Glass (1976)
  16. La Soufrière (1977)
  17. Stroszek (1977)
  18. Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979)
  19. Woyzeck (1979)
  20. Fitzcarraldo (1982)
  21. Where the Green Ants Dream (1984)
  22. Cobra Verde (1987)
  23. Echoes From a Somber Empire (1990)
  24. Scream of Stone (1991)
  25. Lessons of Darkness (1992)
  26. Bells from the Deep (1993)
  27. Little Dieter Needs to Fly (1997)
  28. My Best Fiend (1999)
  29. Wings of Hope (2000)
  30. Pilgrimage (2001)
  31. Invincible (2001)
  32. Ten Minutes Older: The Trumpet - (Ten Thousand Years Older) (2002)
  33. Wheel of Time (2003)
  34. The White Diamond (2004)
  35. The Wild Blue Yonder (2005)
  36. Grizzly Man (2005)
  37. Rescue Dawn (2007)
  38. Encounters at the End of the World (2007)

[edit] TV

  1. The Flying Doctors of East Africa (1969)
  2. Handicapped Future (1971)
  3. Glaube und Währung (1980)
  4. God's Angry Man (1980)
  5. Huie's Sermon (1980)
  6. The Dark Glow of the Mountains (1984)
  7. Ballad of the Little Soldier (1984)
  8. Les Français vus par... - (Les Gaulois) (1988)
  9. Wodaabe - Herdsmen of the Sun (1989)
  10. Film Lesson 1-4 (1990)
  11. Jag Mandir (1991)
  12. The Transformation of the World Into Music (1994)
  13. Gesualdo: Death for Five Voices (1995)
  14. The Lord and the Laden (a.k.a. God of the Burdened) [part 9 of the series "2000 Years of Christianity"] (1999)
  15. Wings of Hope (2000)

[edit] Opera

  1. Giovanna d'Arco (1989)
  2. Lohengrin (opera) (1991)
  3. La Donna del lago (1992)
  4. Tannhäuser (Wagner) (2000)

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b Bissell, Tom. "The Secret Mainstream: Contemplating the mirages of Werner Herzog". Harper's. December 2006.
  2. ^ a b "Werner Herzog on the Story Behind 'Rescue Dawn'", Fresh Air, October 27, 1998. Retrieved on 2007-06-21. 
  3. ^ Werner Herzog audio commentary to DVD of Signs of Life

[edit] Further reading

  • Paul Cronin. Herzog on Herzog (London: Faber and Faber Ltd., 2002, ISBN 0571207081)
  • Werner Herzog. Eroberung des Nutzslosen (Munich: Carl Hanser Verlag, 2004, ISBN 3-446-20457-1)
  • ("Conquest of the Useless," Herzog's diaries of the making of Fitzcarraldo -- published in Italian as La Conquista dell'Inutile, English translation in preparation)
  • Descheneaux, A. Présence Wagnérienne dans le film Invincible (2001) de Werner Herzog in Canadian University Music Review 24:30–61 n1 2003
  • Herzog, Werner. Of Walking in Ice. Free Association. 2007.

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:


v • d • e
Films directed by Werner Herzog
1960s
1970s
1980s
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)
v • d • e
Cinema of Germany


Persondata
NAME Herzog, Werner
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Werner Stipetić
SHORT DESCRIPTION German film director, screenwriter, actor, and opera director.
DATE OF BIRTH 5 September 1942
PLACE OF BIRTH Bavaria
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH