Fric et foi

God's Angry Man (1980)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Werner Herzog documentary about teleangelist Gene Scott who came under fire by the FCC in the late 1970s. Scott is certainly a strange character and Herzog does a good job at showing how much power this guy had over his viewers and he's also honest in showing why the FCC and others would come after him. The only somewhat annoying thing really isn't the films's fault but in the interview clips Scott will be speaking in English and then Herzog will narrate, in German, just what he said and this goes on throughout the documentary.

This probably isn't one of Herzog's best films -- and it certainly doesn't compare to some of his other documentaries, including "My Best Fiend," "Little Dieter Needs to Fly," "Lessons of Darkness" or even "Gesualdo." However, the subject matter is fascinating. I won't attempt to explain the late Dr. Gene Scott -- he needed to be experienced to be understood. For a while I was privileged to live where I could hear Dr. Scott on the radio 24 hours a day, and I have to confess that I found him compulsively listenable. Sure, he was a preacher, but in my experience he rarely really talked about religion. When he did, he preached strictly to the choir. The upshot is that Scott never really seemed to be trying to communicate with anyone, but carrying on a tortured inner dialog in a kind of code. The many flashes of paranoia and anger (usually directed at the government and his audience) and his borderline-abuse of his co-workers (constantly ordering his music director -- what was his name again -- to play the same song for the umpteenth time) further suggested that we were just watching or listening to a man struggling with himself.

The problem is that the best and most unbelievable Scott documentary would simply be to present a 90 minute segment of him doing his usual show -- I don't think even Herzog would dispute that. Here, we get a bit of Scott doing that, but also a lot of time is spent watching his volunteers answer phones, hearing from his parents and hearing Scott talking, very lucidly, in the back of a car. Scott also modestly described himself as just an employee-at-will reporting to some unseen church board of directors (likely only in the sense that Hank Greenberg was one). While it was interesting to hear where his anti-government diatribes came from, the movie was very tame and restrained compared to the man himself.

Still, anyone who had the longevity Scott had (yes, he's still on the air, albeit posthumously, and you can hear him streaming over the internet 24/7) can't really be a raving lunatic, and Scott was far from one. This comes across strongly in the documentary. What Herzog succeeds in showing us is not so much anger as extreme isolation and detachment. Scott was a brilliant man (we're reminded of his Stanford pedigree a couple of times) whose disdain for the world the rest of us live in caused him to build and occupy a startlingly persistent mirage. In this sense, the film is of a piece with Herzog's other documentaries that explore the many points of articulation between sanity and madness, reality and dream.

Dr. Gene Scott, was a televangelist who daily broadcast marathon length live broadcasts demanding donations to his church. In this film we see parts of his performance, which includes him ranting at his audience and even refusing to speak until sufficient money is donated. We also see him count the huge sums that evidently and quite amazingly were donated by unknown disciples.

Taking into account that the subject matter is very interesting coupled with the fact that it is directed by Werner Herzog, this has to be considered a bit disappointing. Herzog has made several films, both fact and fiction alike, featuring central characters who are so very far removed from societal norms to the point of being isolated in life. Scott is another character very much in this vein, yet this film never makes as much impact as it should. In fairness, it's not helped much by Herzog constantly translating into German over the top of the English dialogue. Obviously this must have been on account of this being targeted at a television audience in Germany, yet it is still very distracting and it is unfortunate that subtitles were not simply used for non-English speakers. Anyhow, Herzog interviews Scott behind the scenes and he is an altogether different character in this context; full of doubts and fears, unlike his TV persona who is black and white in his opinions and sure of his position. Also of note, we are exposed to several musical numbers by Scott's in house band The Statesman. These are very strange religious songs, sung along to heroically horrendous music and performed by unusual scarily upbeat men. These songs were interesting in their utter bizarreness.

This is a documentary about a reverend attempting to raise money for his church in 8+ hour long TV shows that are - to put it softly - out of the ordinary. If you've seen Herzog movies before, you know more or less what to expect: A weird atmosphere, a quite crazy character whom you'll still sympathize with, subtle strange and disturbing things happening all along, and when it all ends you find your eyes are slightly crossed and your mind very bent.

You'll see something not very unlike the insane "dancing chicken" ending of Stroszek and the interview with Grizzly Man's parents. There is also some absolutely amazing Hammond organ backed music here, live from the TV show - with some exceptionally passionate singers that will give you chills, one way or another! Herzog's choice of music is as always utterly fascinating - just like the rest of the movie.

Herzog fans can't miss this. If you don't know who the hell Herzog is, go see Grizzly Man - and return to this documentary once you're hooked.

(FYI if you decide to check this out, it's filmed in English but Herzog talks over and translates in German, not a distraction per-say but it would be interesting to see a version with it in English only, but alas this is all that's available on Tubi).

This is impactful because Herzog understands how to talk to his subject and to make someone who might usually be on his guard or just putting on another 'face' for the media as the firebrand he created for his show to be natural and therefore be... vulnerable, to an extent. It's hard to ever feel sorry for this sort of prototype of countless grifters and shysters fleecing money from the most gullible, but the entire surreal atmosphere of what this man is surrounded by in his studio, and how that contrasts (or is connected to) what he tells Herzog as his dissatisfaction with how his life has gone - sometimes in a TMI sort of way - makes one understand him completely, and you end the documentary with a far more complex portrait than would come about on any news program (even 60 Minutes, indeed).

I was engrossed in the light spectacle of those painfully white-bread Christian singers, and for all of Dr. Scott's bragadoccio and eventually rage against his supporters not sending enough money, compared to what we have today he is almost quaint. He's a classic firebrand of a demagogue, but he knows it and the self conscious understanding humanizes him (on the other hand, maybe 45 minutes is the limit to what one can fake of what he has to say, Herzog doesn't get too deep into what may be more xenophobic beliefs, and that's fine, the information about his *70* lawsuits against him is enough).

Suffice to say the F. C. C. Monkey Band set piece raised my rating a half a star. Herzog did not even have to set anything up, one of his great confoundingly surreal set pieces was someone else's unironic doing.