Fata Morgana

Fata Morgana is an absolute masterpiece. It's Werner Herzog's most unconventional film. It doesn't have a plot or story. Instead of a story, we're given a collection of images, words and music that work so wonderfully together. It's not a documentary either. Some of the people in this film are directed and given lines to read. It has some of the most beautiful and haunting images. Herzog shoots real mirages and we see cars and people floating around in the middle of the desert who aren't actually there but hundreds of miles away reflected like in a mirror. The use of music in this movie is so brilliant - from Leonard Cohen, Mozart, and the Third Ear Band. Imagine Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey in the desert; that's what this movie is like. This film is so hypnotic that it has the ability to make you feel as though your spirit has left your body. A must see. It will change the way you view films. Rating: 10 out of 10.

Inarguably one of the most interesting filmmakers of the last 50 years, Werner Herzog has been pushing the boundaries of cinema perhaps more so than any other commercial filmmaker. I've been acquainted with Herzog for a few decades now and I've never not been impressed by both the man and his work. Last year I went to see Rescue Dawn and was somewhat surprised at how relatively mainstream the film was, yet couldn't help but imagine Herzog taking his actors and crew into the actual jungle to not only make the film, but to live it. No other filmmaker is as crazed about the purity of the film-making process and the subsequent lore from such productions as Fitzcarraldo has been forged into cinematic legend.

Today I sat down to Fata Morgana, a 1969 Herzog film that could be described as an allegorical filmic postcard. Without researching the actual locations, I'm assuming it was shot somewhere in Africa, both coastal and desert, a region that could have once been the cradle of infant man, infant civilization, infant life on earth. It is these origins, the biblical notion of the Garden of Eden and the Apocalypse that Herzog is concerned with, as is voiced by the narration dispensed throughout the 79 minute run time.

Watching FM I couldn't help but feel I was a passenger on a profound journey. In the opening sequence, the title is translated as "Mirage" and Herzog juxtaposes this translation with multiple repetitions of commercial jets landing on an airstrip. These images are perverted, their 3-dimensionality crushed flat by a long lens, piling layers of exhaust, heat waves and light aberrations all on top of one another. The effect left me to conclude: things are not as they seem.

FM is divided into 3 very distinct chapters: 1) Creation, 2) Paradise and 3) The Golden Age. Chapter One, opens with countless, languid images, where bleak, barren landscapes scroll by, dead animals rot, broken shells of crashed airplanes and abandoned cars slowly disintegrate in the desert sun. The people populating this inhospitable landscape are ragged, unsmiling and apparent prisoners of the desert. The narration talks of a time before life, a time where the canvas of earth was blank and all that existed were the heavens. While the narration hearkens to a simpler, purer era, a portrait of a young boy holding a fox-like animal by its throat evokes a chilling depiction of man's cruel, ruthless attempt to enforce a dominion over nature.

In the next chapter we are introduced to more of the same, yet the images and people are more animated and seem infused with a modicum of life and vitality. We listen to a goggled biologist talk about the difficultly a monitor lizard has hunting for prey in such a lifeless environment. As he holds the squirming monitor, its tongue flicking at flies, he also describes how difficult it to capture these creatures in the searing 140 degree heat. The parallel is duly noted and Herzog continues to explore this concept through repeated, candid portraits of individuals battered by the sun, the desert and the laborious efforts required to exist in this harsh realm. He also pushes forward the theme that if not in control, man asserts his control over his environment and not always in the most pleasant of ways.

The last chapter takes us out of the desert's blast furnace and into the more familiar Herzog territory populated by eccentrics and absurd behavior. No one seems to have a more effective symbiotic relationship with the oddballs of the world than Herzog -- possibly this is where he feels most at home. Much like Errol Morris, Herzog chooses to place his camera in as seemingly objective a position as he can before he lets the film roll. The subsequent flirtation Herzog has with his subject is the result of him being able to continue shooting well beyond the point when most directors would have yelled cut. As Morris does, this extended roll pushes past the "on" moment the subjects feel obliged to offer and through their discomfort of being pushed into overtime, their facade gives way to something real. The most humorous portrait in this chapter is of the 2 person band playing an odd, polka-like song that Herzog recycles throughout this chapter. The drummer of the band wears the same goggles as the biologist, as does another guy doing a magic trick, begging the question: what's with the goggles? They definitely add some levity to the film, but one has to wonder if they hold any deeper meaning or significance, or is this just another example of Herzog's playfullness.

The narration aside, Herzog utilizes folk and blues music as the experimental documentary's soundtrack. Leonard Cohen grabs the most screen time, two of his beautifully melancholic songs "So Long Marianne" and "Suzanne." perfectly accompany the scrolling landscapes, adding to the convincing feel that we are truly along for the ride. By the end of the journey, Herzog comes back to one of the many shots that recur throughout the film: the distant framing of a lone vehicle traversing the endless desert engulfed by a water mirage that fills the horizon. Despite the overall bleakness of FM, the crescendo of the film and the mirage motif leave you with a hopeful spirit, belief that against all odds, life will persevere and possibly even flourish.

Having finished writing this post, I referenced FM to discover that Herzog shot it in Saharan Cameroon only weeks after a bloody coup. True to his legend, Herzog and his crew were arrested, beaten and imprisoned. While imprisoned, Herzog fell ill with Schistosomiasis, a blood parasite. It's truly hard not to love such a hypnotic and austere film as Fata Morgana; knowing the filmmaker was willing to die to get it made only makes you respect it all the more.

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Successful films on metaphysical subjects are rare, but Fata Morgana is a good case. You can chalk up the large subject to the ambitions of youth, but Herzog does an amazingly good job. The movie's point is to show human beings, and even the world, from a non-human point of view.

The movie is in three parts: Creation, Paradise, and The Golden Age. The imagery of each is in counterpoint to the voice-over. Although the text of `The Creation' (from the Popol Vuh, a Mayan myth) refers to the primordial wasteland, the scene goes no further in illustrating the myth. It dwells on the waste, and on various specimens of destruction (fire, smoke, wrecked vehicles). The images from `Paradise' are anything but that, and `The Golden Age' is darkly comic – the highest culture is the strange roadside musical act.

The Popol Vuh suggests that mankind is the central object of creation, but the movie does everything it can to undo this notion. Its mythological framework has no referent in human historical time. There are no human characters to speak of. When a boy stands with a dog in an extended shot, the initial suggestion is of the boy's point of view; by the end it is much more the dog's. Likewise the lizard is a stronger character than the human who introduces it, and the turtle's partner barely looks human with his big flippers.

Animal stories and nature documentaries always anthropomorphize, but Fata Morgana has none of that. Certainly the dunes look like a female body, but the simile cuts both ways. Presumably only humans can distinguish easily between their creation and nature, and here airplanes and factories are presented alongside mountains, lakes, and waterfalls. People and civilization are all part of a broader natural landscape.

In 1979 Herzog put a new twist on the idea when he remade Nosferatu from the vampire's point of view.

Herzog has produced works of genius. That's because he has incredibly trustworthy cinematic intuition, believes in forces that called be charmed forth and is unafraid to take deep risks in his quest for the hypnotic.

He also has some interesting things to say about his work. But I advise you to _not_ listen to what he has to say because the subtlety and depth of his work is greater than his conscious insights.

A man like this constantly works/ Some of his output is well formed, others just notebooks. This is the latter. It still has moments of wonder but the scope is very local. This is a collection of short form studies. During this period, he was also writing journals, several hundred pages of cinematic notes. Next years "Wrath" was where these ideas were coherently shaped.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

--- most of Herzog's films are best watched with the commentary. His overpowering germanesque English always 'pumps' up the importance of the events/images of his films. In the DVD commentary of this film Crispin Glover is invited along to give his thoughts also.

I am very partial to Herzog's films. That said, I find this one toward the top of his heap. There is a certain 'rawness' to the structure and sequences of this film. I believe that most of it was shot during other projects and pieced from footage that was taken in the Sahara. The early parts of the film are the strongest images, the equivalent of moving paintings, showing care in subtle differences in the landscape. There is an erie science fiction quality to the early part of the film that might even be reminiscent of 'Dune'--- mostly for the desert images.

The later part of the film is more about a human interaction with the landscape. These people are not actors but ordinary people that Herzog (i'm sure) told them to stand around acting weird--- or maybe genuinely acting foreign to what we know---- many of the people were being filmed for the first time (he loves sophisticating the natives--- tricking them with his modern equipment---

---one bit of advice--- don't attempt to watch this if you have distractions around--- you have to be in a quiet mood to sustain watching it--- (even I have a hard time sitting through it)---hence my recommend of watching it with the commentary