Madness For Mass Consumption: Werner Herzog And The Fictional Real
Werner Herzog’s cinema is well
known for blurring classifications of fiction and non-fiction, of traditional
narrative cinema and documentary. As such it is often difficult to distinguish,
or even trust, what one is seeing up on screen. Part of the ambiguity is rooted
in our own need for dichotomies, the idea that we can categorically define
fiction from non-fiction, even if it is only on a film by film basis. Dirk
Eitzen argues documentary as a mode of reception[1],
whereby a spectator might distinguish between the fiction and non-fiction by
asking if the film might be ‘lying’; fiction is, after all, not a lie and so the question only becomes
pertinent to non-fiction cinema. We do not ask if Die Hard is lying, but we might raise such concerns over the work
of Michael Moore. This ‘either/or’ approach leads to our categorising films as
one or the other – never both at the same time. Of course, linguistically, it
does not make sense to say that something can be fiction and non-fiction
simultaneously, and yet with the films of Herzog we often find these two forces
at work, in a constant state of flux. While Eitzen might maintain that an
individual film can shift from one to another from moment to moment, Herzog’s
films shift in shades of grey, never really being either at any given time.
Vivian Sobchack argues that every
so often, a certain element or idea contained within a fiction film will engage
our ‘documentary consciousness’[2],
that is to say, a momentary break from the traditional patterns of suspension
of disbelief caused by some comment, event or image that makes us aware of the
reality behind the film. She cites the particular example of the image of a
rabbit being shot in the hunting sequence from The Rules Of The Game (Jean Renoir, 1939) and how the comfortable
position of being a viewer of fiction is shaken by our awareness that the
rabbit has really been shot, that it will not be getting up again after the
director has shouted ‘cut’. Here we can see a similar, though not identical,
idea to Eitzen; certain moments during a fiction film can shift to non-fiction
because a different level of perception has been engaged. But rather than
Eitzen’s choice to read the film as ‘either/or’, Sobchack claims that these
moments bring attention to elements which are constantly at play in live-action
cinema but which we often take for granted. It is not a choice for the viewer; Renoir’s rabbit shocks us into this
realisation. Thus, while both acknowledge elements of fiction and non-fiction
are nestled in a film text, waiting to be acknowledged or revealed at different
points during a film’s runtime, Eitzen views the process as a kind of magic-eye
trick, we see Wittgenstein’s rabbit or duck, not both at the same time; but
Sobchack views the process as a rude awakening, a violent shake from our
viewing patterns.
These elements described by
Eitzen and Sobchack only begin to graze the surface of how these intersecting
elements of fiction and fact are utilised by the films of Herzog, often
intentionally engaging our ‘documentary consciousness’ in fictions and asking
us to suspend our disbelief in apparent documentaries. It is a defining aspect
of Herzog’s cinema that it has never concretely committed to either bracket of
fiction or non-fiction. It is as if – understanding the central nature of the
film camera (that it records objectively whatever is put in front of it) – Herzog
realises that even the most meticulously rehearsed fiction is still a factual
record of that performance event. But on top of this, Herzog is undeniably a
fantasist, rearranging the world to suit his perception of it, recounting
stories and anecdotes with such veracity that it scarcely matters that they
never actually happened[3].
It is this dual nature of Herzog the visionary, who has perhaps never really
seen the real world, and his
understanding of the relationship between reality and its photographic record
that has resulted in a career that incorporates the objective truth with the
fantastic of the delusional.
His films invite us to activate
our ‘documentary consciousness’, to try and piece together what we see in front
of us both in terms of its fictive meaning and its factual content
simultaneously. To say that Herzog’s films blur the boundaries between fact and
fiction is to oversimplify and miss the complexities of overlapping layers
between the apparent world of the film and the so-called real world that
surrounds it. We can find this complexity in several Herzog films, not least of
all Heart Of Glass (1976), a film
which might be termed fiction but that undoubtedly speaks to our awareness of
the circumstances existing outside of – and sometimes in – the frame.
The film employs a ‘gimmick’ that
is separate from the fictional narrative but adds to the effect of the film and
its theme. The story is one of mass hysteria and obsessive madness that grips a
small isolated village when the secret of how to produce Ruby Glass is lost due
to the death of the head glass-blower, who took the secret to his grave. This
eerie sense of mass hysteria, of people no longer thinking entirely as
individuals, is conveyed in the performances of the actors, most of whom
performed under hypnosis. This factor is not a narrative conceit, it is not the
story of characters being hypnotised. Hypnosis is employed to create the effect
of a dream-like state, a distracted kind of illogical thinking that the
characters are in the grip of.
This difference – the actors are
in a condition that the characters are not – heightens our awareness of the
film’s relationship to the real. On one level, it is quite possible to read the
film as a documentary about people under hypnosis, the narrative simply
existing as a framing device. When, for instance, one character smashes a glass
on the head of another character, he does not wince on the impact so deeply in
trance is he. We not only take in the narrative significance of the scene – the
characters being hostile toward one another – but are also impressed with the
response of the human body under hypnosis. The ‘documentary consciousness’ is
elicited through much of the film but within the context of fiction, not as a
shock moment that shifts our perception to another level.
Thus, with Herzog’s cinema the
distinctions between fiction and non-fiction break down, as quite often the
imagery that we see is carefully designed to be both at the same time. It is
precisely this ambiguity, this impossibility to define which image is fact or
which event fiction, that has led to the most common criticism levelled against
him – the ethics behind the production and presentation of his images[4].
How much of his ‘fact’ is created, how much of his ‘fiction’ a record of
reality? These questions are particularly pertinent when looking at the
tempestuous relationship between Herzog and his friend/opponent Klaus Kinski,
who starred in five of Herzog’s feature films and was the subject of one of his
documentaries. Like the native workers in Fitzcarraldo
(1982), one might view Kinski as equally the subject of Herzog’s
documentary gaze.
The relationship between Herzog
and Kinski is well documented as being an intense and largely irrational one
where the two butted heads over nearly everything – not least of all because
both men were equally as single-minded, obsessive and self-absorbed – and yet
apparently remained strong friends up until their final film together. Kinski
was known for being impossible to work with, his bursts of rage at the
slightest provocation made shooting scenes with him highly difficult. Likewise,
Herzog is still associated with an Ahab-like desire to shoot a film in exactly
the way he has decided, irrelevant of how uncomfortable or even dangerous this
makes life for his cast and crew. Putting two such volatile figures in close
proximity would inevitably lead to emotional explosions.
Made eight years after the death
of Kinski, Herzog’s My Best Fiend
(1999) claims to show us the nature of this relationship as objective fact,
though it is very clear from the start that Herzog has a very specific agenda
in mind, even if it subconscious. Opening with footage of Kinski raving at an
audience during one of his ‘Jesus Tours’ (though the film never informs us of
this), this image of Kinski – as a raving madman, ranting at the masses before
him – is presented entirely without context. Though the footage itself is
objective, it was shot by someone other than Herzog, capturing a genuine spur
of the moment response from Kinski (though how genuine the response is could be debated), the presentation of the footage by Herzog demonises Kinski from the
very beginning. Indeed, Herzog often portrays “Kinski as the culprit rather
than the subject of the documentary”[5]
through this kind of presentation, throwing a certain kind of light on Kinski
that obscures some parts of his character.
This opening is then juxtaposed
by the very sedate Herzog himself who politely makes his way through the flat
where Herzog lived as a child, in the same building as Kinski, now owned by a
well-to-do German couple. Herzog’s intention is quite clear, to accuse Kinski
of irrationality and himself of level-headedness. He proceeds to tour the flat,
pointing out where he and his family used to live and the various places where
Kinski threw his many fits. Though he speaks to the old couple, it is clear
that they are merely an excuse; Herzog is relating these facts to us.
The opening establishes the two
complexities that lie in both the film text and the relationship between the
two men. Firstly, Herzog is very conscious of Kinski’s mental instability. His
childhood memories make it quite clear that he was well aware of what Kinski
was like at home, never mind when
under the pressures of trying to shoot a film in the Amazon. And yet Herzog
still consciously placed Kinski in situations where he knew he would get angry.
Secondly, as was touched on a moment ago, Kinski’s ravings during the Jesus
Tours might not be as authentic as they first appear. As Herzog mentions later
in the film, many of the audiences for the Jesus Tour simply wanted to watch
him rave. We might wonder whether Kinski consciously placed himself in these
situations, setting himself up to be infuriated because he knew that it would
go down well.
And so we must ask, how much of
the relationship between these two men was the result of their own conscious
attempts to elicit particular responses from one another? And on top of this,
how much of Herzog’s version of Kinski is a creation of the film, a fiction being documented? Here the
ethics of presentation are highlighted. Is My
Best Fiend really an accurate documentary or a fictional account of a real
person, presented as fact? Here, perhaps, is where Eitzen’s ideas would appear
to be most suited to Herzog’s cinema. Because of its claims to objectivity –
claims rare in Herzog – we are forced to ask “might the film be lying?”.
Herzog constantly makes claims
that are never corroborated. He tells a story of how one of the men working
cutting down trees while filming Fitzcarraldo
cut off his own leg after being bitten by a snake. Herzog says that he had to
make sure that Kinski didn’t find out because he would begin raving once it
became clear that he was no longer the centre of attention. At no point are we
meant to question this claim or what it tells us about Kinski, even though it
is entirely supposition on Herzog’s part. When interviewing Eva Mattes, he
prefigures the interview – which shows Kinski in a distinctly positive light –
with the statement “she was one of the few women with anything good to say
about Kinski”. And yet we are never shown one of the apparent multitude of women
with something bad to say about him. We are simply told to believe that this is
the case; Herzog’s word is proof enough.
Another important consideration
to take into account in terms of Kinski’s role in Herzog’s films is the
responsibility of Herzog in eliciting so much of Kinski’s rage. One of the
extras from Aguirre, Wrath Of God
(1972) recounts the story of how Kinski hit him over the head with the hilt of
his sword, cutting him in the process. Had he not been wearing his helmet, he
tells Herzog, he would probably have died. And yet this story is presented
without the slightest hint of blame towards Herzog, who had brought Kinski out
to the jungle to be in the film, fully aware – as his childhood memories
testify – of what he was capable of. This point, that Herzog is the one who has
placed Kinski in such extreme conditions in order to get the reactions that he
requires for his vision, is key to understanding both Aguirre and Fitzcarraldo.
Though Kinski was undoubtedly a terror to work with, nearly all of the extreme
stories of his behaviour in My Best Fiend
are taken from the filming of these two works. Both of which were shot in
circumstances difficult enough to push a well-balanced individual over the
edge, never mind one as volatile as Klaus Kinski.
Les Blank’s Burden Of Dreams (1982), a revealing documentary on the making of Fitzcarraldo, shows Herzog as an
uncompromising man obsessed with the achievement of his artistic vision – a
vision which can only become realised once he and his crew have hauled a real
steamer ship over a mountain. Everything is secondary to his vision; at one
stage the engineer in charge of safety quits because he is convinced that the
pulley system will break and kill a great many people. In a scene before he
leaves, we see him and Herzog discussing the pulley system and the potential
fatalities. Herzog very casually asks “If there were sixty people, how many
could die?”. Unfair though it might be it is difficult not to read this moment
as Herzog weighing up acceptable losses.
The fact that Herzog in no small
way mirrors his lead characters in their obsessive single-mindedness is
significant to understanding his approach to fiction. Often the lead characters
– flawed though they certainly are – are presented as tragic antiheroes; the
pursuit of the dream, even if that dream is never realised, is viewed as a
noble cause, worth the sacrifices made by the characters. As such, it seems,
Blank’s documentary wants to mirror the fictions of Herzog, focusing on the
misery and obsession, the insane attempt to go up against the odds and nature.
When Herzog finally does get the boat over the mountain, this is mentioned as
an afterthought in the documentary’s last few minutes. Although in reality the
feat was a success, Blank’s film is interested concerned with the more dramatic
near-failure.
It is not only Herzog who mirrors
the lead characters of these films; Kinski too is a persona closely bound to
the fictional Aguirre and Fitzcarraldo – not least of all because we can never
be entirely sure which entity – fictive character or factual Kinski – we are
watching at any given time. His characters were driven to insanity and
desperation through the extremity of their surroundings, just as he is driven
toward a similar state through the process of filmmaking.
Both of the ‘jungle films’ can be
seen in this context. Kinski’s responses to the surrounding environment were –
though certainly extreme – nonetheless understandable. As My Best Fiend demonstrates, Kinski was in fact far better behaved
when filming in European civilisation, the circumstances of being isolated in
the Amazonian jungle might well be largely responsible for his oft cited
erratic behaviour. And we might well blame Herzog for placing Kinski and his
fellow cast members in these circumstances. As the narration from Burden Of Dreams informs us: “Herzog
claims that the isolated location will bring out special qualities in the
actors and even the film crew” – with Herzog happily admitting that the
isolated filming is not a necessity for the narrative but instead designed to
elicit the right effect, we can see how the production circumstances of both Fitzcarraldo and Aguirre were much the same as with Heart Of Glass.
Fitzcarraldo in particular is famed as an example of how the
production circumstances mirrored the content of the film, how the “production
difficulties somehow became the real event of which the film when it finally
appeared seemed in a sense to merely record”[6].
Determined to do in reality what Fitzcarraldo does in the fiction, Herzog was
not content to simply construct a series of special effects to demonstrate the
fiction – he was determined to simply do it and, documentary like, record it
actually happening. There are no ‘special effects’ as we watch the natives at
work on the pulley system that really moves the steamer uphill (though there is
some traditional smoke-and-mirrors; a bulldozer is pulling much of the weight).
When it breaks in the story, it is because it actually broke in reality. In
fact, so blurred is the line between fact and fiction with Herzog that a shot
of a native apparently crushed to death under the boat was thought to be real,
even though we can see him get up and wash the mud and blood from his clothes
in Blank’s documentary.
One might easily read Fitzcarraldo as a documentary framed
(and justified) by fiction. The moving of the boat over the hill, the pulley
mechanism built to achieve this, the section of jungle cut away to nothing in
order to build the system; all of this occurred in reality and is recorded as
such, with occasional fictional inserts of Fitzcarraldo and his crew. But the
only reason that Herzog wanted to move the steamer over the mountain in the
first place was because it occurred in the fiction. It is a fictional
presentation of a documentary record of a fictional event. Even the documentary
elements are intertwined with the fictional so as to defy any sort of clear
distinction.
Like the multilayered
presentation of Kinski as man/monster/character/actor/objective truth/imagined
fantasy, Herzog’s films are mercurial by definition. No system of
classification or ontological debate can fully encapsulate the odd world-view
captured and expressed in his films. His cinema is neither fact nor fiction,
simply film – any attempt to try and pigeonhole them further would be an effort
too much even for Herzog’s characters to attempt.
Bibilography
Bachman, G. – ‘The Man On The
Volcano: A Portrait Of Werner Herzog’ in Film
Quarterly (Vol. 31, No. 1, 1977)
Basoli, A. G. – ‘The Wrath Of
Klaus Kinski: An Interview With Werner Herzog’ in Cineaste (Vol. 24, No. 4, 1999)
Corrigan, Timothy – ‘Producing
Herzog: From A Body Of Images’ pp. 3-19 in The Films Of Werner Herzog: Between
Mirage And History (Edited by Timothy Corrigan), Routledge, 1987
Eitzen, Dirk – ‘When Is A
Documentary?: Documentary As A Mode Of Reception’ in Cinema Journal (Vol. 35, No. 1, 1995)
Elsaesser, Thomas – ‘An
Anthropologist’s Eye: Where The Green
Ants Dream’ pp. 133-156 in The Films
Of Werner Herzog: Between Mirage And History (Edited by Timothy Corrigan),
Routledge, 1987
Sobchack, Vivian – Carnal Thoughts: Embodiment And Moving Image
Culture, University Of California Press, 2004
