——Herzog and Land Cruiser Side Story
In September 1942, on the Eastern Front of Europe during World War II, the Germans will launch a new round of offensive on Stalingrad. And our protagonist Werner Herzog (Werner Herzog) will also be born in Munich this maiden month, just before his first internationally renowned feature film "Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes" was released. There are still thirty full years. Of course, Herzog has not been idle for the past 30 years. At the age of 14, he walked alone from Munich to the border of the former Yugoslavia; when he was in middle school, he worked as a welder and a parking lot manager; he had no place in the United States after dropping out. Wen wandered around; he fled to Mexico because his visa expired and did some smuggling and noose-throwing work; after filming the first feature film "Signs of Life", he went to Africa, Uganda, Algeria, Cameroon, Congo and other places to shoot a few Documentary; bet with the actors, then jumped into the cactus field and became a cactus himself.
In 1972, Herzog used his 35mm camera stolen from the Munich Film Academy to shoot "The Scourge" in the Amazon jungle. The funds depended on his savings and sold boots and watches. The entire shooting process took only one and a half months. At the end of the shooting, Klaus Kinski broke his contract and wanted to leave. Herzog found Kinski calmly and said: I have a gun, I will kill myself with a bullet, but I will kill you first. We all know that this is just the beginning of 15 years of cooperation between these two madmen. In 1979, they worked together to film "Nosferatu" and "Woyzeck" continuously. It is worth mentioning that the same annuity Nastassja Kinski (Nastassja Kinski), the youngest daughter of Ski’s dancing girl in a nightclub, lives with his 25-year-old Roman Raymond Polański, and is famous for her role in Tess. The noise is far better than his father.
The omnipotent Herzog can always shoot a bunch of documentaries at the same time he travels across five continents and four oceans to make feature films, and also prepares another epic film while shooting a bunch of documentaries. This troubles me very much, and I can't understand it. Was it the filming of "Dwarf Grows Up as a Child" when filming the documentary "The Mirage", or did it shoot "The Mirage" when I was preparing to film "Dwarf Grows Up as a Child". This fine tradition was also passed on to Les Blank, who filmed "Herzog Eats His Shoes" when Herzog was preparing for "Fitzcarraldo" (Fitzcarraldo). "", when Herzog was filming "Landing on the Boat", he shot "Burden of Dreams" by the way. At the same time, he also beautifully planted his "Garlic Is As Good As Good As" (Garlic Is As Good As Ten Mothers) hard and wide.
In Herzog’s dictionary, there is no word “artist”. He feels that he is more like the kind of medieval craftsman, creating his own works in obscurity with his apprentices, and having a formal sense of the materials being produced. emotion. He and DOGME 95 (DOGME incorporates its own films into a rule, they see from the avant-garde definition that individualistic films are bound to decline!) There are many things in common. He believes that the creators themselves have nothing. The inner importance, only the work itself will become the only important thing.
The 1970s was the peak of Herzog's production. Almost every moment, he traveled through the jungles, deserts and even volcanoes around the world to shoot movies. For a guy whose inspiration and motor nerves burst together, Herzog's glorious decade I have always been looking for location, looking for various types of native actors, fooling investors, digging out various documentary themes, and spending time with Kinsky. So we are not surprised that the preparatory period for "A Boat on the Land" started after he went to a small island in the Caribbean Sea to film "Soufriere Volcano". From the above evidence of the brief chronicle of Herzog, we can easily conclude that Herzog is a crazy person and there is nothing he can't do. After going through the preparations for the filming of "Landing on the Boat", we will have a more rational understanding of our old friend Herzog-he is just an ordinary person who likes to do things.
Germination:
Herzog was a ski jumper when he was a boy and played for a long time in a local football team in Munich. Of course, he is also a hiking enthusiast, at least four times before filming "Railboat". Trekking through Europe, America and Africa. He once compared the experience of a ski jumper with his career as a director. Once the filming begins, no one can help you. You must overcome your fear and shoot the film to the end.
Regarding his learning and thinking process, Herzog believes that a person may only have an unforgettable experience of enlightenment and enlightenment after appreciating other people's works five or six times in his life. Herzog is in Kleist Heinrichvon (German playwright), in Bach’s "Musical Devotion" (MUSIKALISCHES OPFER), in the poet Quilling Coleman who knows little, in Todd Brown Ning (Charles Albert Browning, pioneer of the cult) film "The Freak" and Dreyer (Carl Theodor Dreyer, Danish director)'s "The Passion of Joan of Arc" both felt this.
Many years ago, Herzog drove through the small town of Carnac on the Brittany peninsula in France. After seeing Stonehenge, he started thinking about how the ancients used the tools of the Stone Age to stand up these tens of tons of boulders. Okay? After thinking about it for 2 days, Herzog decided to make a movie about it.
A friend told Herzog about Fitzcarraldo. He was a greedy rubber tycoon at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. He broke up a ship and transported it overland to the adjacent river. Reassemble in. Herzog revised Fitzcarando's identity and adapted this experience, sketching out the sketch of "Traveling by Land".
Another anecdote I don’t know what role it played in Herzog’s heart at the time. At that time, during the filming of "The Scourge" in the Amazon jungle, an amazing thing happened in this forest. A 17-year-old German girl, In 1971, the plane crashed in Peru from the forest. Everyone was killed. Only she survived and walked out of the jungle by her own efforts. This flight Herzog happened to be missed. When Herzog was filming "The Scourge" in the jungle, the girl was fighting for survival in the unknown vicinity. This story Herzog was made into "Wings of Hope" (Julianes Sturz in den Dschungel) in 1999. In the same year, Herzog filmed the documentary "Mein liebster Feind-Klaus Kinski" (Mein liebster Feind-Klaus Kinski).
Preparation:
It is difficult to understand the ins and outs of the whole preparation from Herzog's "Herzog on Herzog" like reading "Time in Time" by Tarkovsky, but you can be in At the same time, listen to the hidden voice and imagine this history.
Script:
I haven’t seen what Herzog’s script looks like, but I know that the release version of "Aboard a Boat" is far from the previous version when filming started. Not only has the male lead and the male pair changed, but even the role setting is also changed. Made substantial cuts. The only constant is to pull the boat up the hill and then into the water. It is not so much to complete such a plot of the film, but it is better to assume that the reason for making such a film is to complete Herzog's dream of moving mountains and seas.
Funding:
Regarding money, Herzog once said that you must be prepared to fight the devil every time you make a movie. But you have to keep going, damn it! Let's light up the fire first. You have to work hard to create something powerful first, and let it create momentum by itself. In the end, money will follow you with its tail clipped like a bereaved dog.
Of course this is just Herzog’s chicken soup for the soul. Every time he shoots a movie, he always has to worry about funding. For example, according to his eleventh movie "The Scourge", he uses his savings as a welder in a steel factory for many years. And taken with borrowed money and stolen camera.
In order to get the investment, you must please investors and choose the protagonists recommended by investors, such as Jack Nicholson (Jack Nicholson) who just finished Kubrick's "The Shining", and the world's hot rock star Mick. Jagger (Mick Jagger, lead singer of the Rolling Stones), as for Claudia Cardinale (Claudia Cardinale) who will nominate the Palme d’Or with "Pelle, La, 1981" and the legendary New Wave producer Renzo Rossellini (the son of Italian director Rossinini) enters that is something later.
As a world-renowned German new movie standard bearer, can't find investment? Take a look at which films are shining all over the world during the same period, 1981? Renzo Rossellini alone participated in the production of Ingmar Bergman's "Fanny and Alexander", Fassbender's "Sailor Querel", Antonioni's "Proof of a Woman's Identity", Tarkovs Ji’s "Nostalgia", Fellini’s "The Ship Continues", "Women City", etc., and my friend Wenders created "Back to Light on the Water", "Room 666", and "State of Things" in the crazy circle of money. "Hammett" and a bunch of movies. Looking back at the US-Japan camp, Kubrick, Polanski, Coppola, Akira Kurosawa, Nagisa Oshima, etc. are all suffocating big moves. How can a weird German director who has used the madman Kinsky to conquer the world?
Shooting "Land Sailing" is like engaging in pyramid schemes, turning to good friends or business partners around me, and finally three investors in "The Scourge", "Nosferatu", "Schuxi's Wanderings" and Renzo Rossellini ( Didn’t you really designate Claudia Katina as the heroine?) Help Herzog on the path of glory or disaster.
Casting:
Why are Jack Nicholson and Mick Jagger instead of Kinsky and Isabel Adjani? It is a bit darker to guess that Herzog, who is very affectionate for Los Angeles and New York, is preparing to enter Hollywood. Otherwise, why did he prepare for so long in the United States and face his own shoes for more than a thousand years. No matter how crazy Jack Nicholson is, he is just a crazy Lakers fan. Kinsky is a guy who walks by rope. To be more realistic, Kinsky played two consecutive Herzog plays in 1979. The two of them held guns and pointed them all day. This guy finally couldn't help but ran to Europe to teach his daughter not to be pedophiles in Poland. Skie fooled around. And Isabel Adjani made a bunch of movies about it. In the same year, there were seven or eight plays. Since it was used as a vase, it couldn't resist the toss of the tropical rain forest.
So why did Jack Nicholson and Mick Jagger ran off, and Kinsky was dragged over to take over? In the native Indian territory in the tropical rainforest, which Hollywood movie stars can afford, let alone the rock stars who fly leaves all day, take advantage of half their lives, and quickly escape back to Gentle Town. It is said that Kinsky was brought over by Herzog by chance in New York. Who believes it? Although Kinsky said that he had a burst of personality and behaved strangely and misbehavior, at least he had never picked up a child. Watching Herzog's hair turn white and round again, there is no reason to help.
Shooting:
"Ship on the Land" is located in the Peruvian jungle. There are actually three crews. One is the crew of Herzog and Jack Nicholson, the other is the crew of Herzog and Kinsky, and the other is the follow-up filming of Herzog. The director’s crew who cooked his own shoes and ate them.
The first crew disbanded in a hurry, and the second and third crews rose to the top of the mountain. So what happened during the shooting?
Build two boats, one is placed in the water, and the other is pulled over the top of the mountain. Real-time shooting is probably a technique that current directors rarely use. No matter what the scene is, it can be achieved only with the help of acousto-optic super-grade in the studio. New Wave or DOGME have sneered at such Hollywood techniques, such as Taco. While filming "Sacrifice", Korowski set fire to the house. Kurosawa set fire to the tower he had painstakingly built when he was filming "Ran". When he came to Herzog, it was nothing more than preparing money and looking for local native Indians. Build two boats for shooting. Then a 350-ton steam ship was pulled over the top of the mountain for 1,800 meters and thrown into the rapids.
Forge all kinds of false official documents and wander among the various forces. "Be prepared and learn how to forge documents. Always carry a silver coin or medal on your body, press it under the paper to create a "seal", and then put a bold signature on it. Remember that you have to sign like it. There are many obstacles to making a movie. The worst is bureaucracy. You have to figure out various ways to deal with this threat. You have to be smarter than it and overcome it in order to Finish your movie. Moreover, the bureaucracy loves files. So you have to keep feeding them with files. Even a forged file can make them happy, provided it is written in It looks very high-end paper." Herzog said.
Regional conflicts and dangerous shooting caused many casualties. From January to February 1981, Peru and Ecuador had several armed conflicts in the Amazonian Forest Kondole Mountains. In addition to military conflicts, there were constant conflicts between local oil oligarchs, rubber farmers, and indigenous tribes. Only the natives attacked the local natives hired by the crew as extras, directly killing and wounding 3 people. Later, in the process of pulling the boat up the mountain with a fixed pulley and a moving pulley cable, even the Brazilian engineer invited by the crew did not believe that this device could carry the big guy. Therefore, the engineer withdrew from the crew and left "only a 30% chance of success, if it fails." Someone will die".
Kinsky who loves and hates. As the soul character of Herzog movies, Kinsky often gets angry and moody because of trivial matters, such as because the coffee is cold, and loses his temper all day in the theater. Of course, this is much more amiable than the 48-hour record of shutting himself into the bathroom at every turn when living in the same building with Herzog in Munich. Herzog later said that (Kinsky) burned himself like a comet. Kinsky was born for me, for my movies.
After:
The film was released in 1982 and Herzog won the Best Director Award at the 35th Cannes Film Festival.
In 1984, after completing the documentary "Song of the Little Soldiers" and "The Glowing Mountains", Herzog started hiking alone from his childhood residence Zahran, and traveled all the way across the border between East and West Germany. After walking about 2,000 kilometers, he fell ill. Return by train.
In 1987, after cooperating with Kinsky to film "African Black Slaves", the relationship between the two broke down, and contact has been interrupted.
In 1991, when Kings died of genetic disease, Herzog took his ashes and scattered them to the Pacific Ocean.
After that, Herzog almost silently helped BBC or Hollywood filming, not otherwise, Herzog is still Herzog, but without Kinsky, Herzog is no longer Herzog.
It is worth mentioning that Yang Dechang was just a fan in the United States when he was a college student, because he watched Herzog's "The Scourge", and later quit his job as an engineer and switched to a movie. With "Yi Yi" or the best of the 53rd Cannes Film Festival director.
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