THE ENIGMA OF KASPAR HAUSAR by Werner Herzog

Kaspar Hausar is certainly memorable. The shot above is one of the things I love most. There are a few such exterior scenes that linger in a way that makes you feel you're really there - outside - with wind rustling through leaves, birds chirping around you. And it's more real and familiar, less painted, than the way someone like Terrence Malick does it. For me, it's as if one of my photos from childhood, when I was one with the grass and the trees, has just come to life.

The guy in this scene is one of Herzog's targets of satire. He tries to introduce a puzzle of logic about a village of liars and a village of truthtellers: if you ask either of them if they are truthtellers, there's no way of knowing if they're telling the truth. Kaspar Hauser, a feral child imprisoned, not freed to join the civilized world until a late age, answers that he would ask both villagers, "Are you a treefrog?" And thus the liar would say, "Yes," and the truthteller would say, "No." And the problem would be solved. The man in the picture, not wanting to agree with his solution, claims that it's more important to "deduce" and be "logical" than it is to find the truth. He's the perfect of example of what's ridiculous in the civilized world, and this is one of the best scenes in the film.

This mountain-climbing scene is visually fascinating and made me feel that it would be fun to work as a background actor on one of Herzog's bizarre expeditions. The vision of masses of people making their way up the slope is one that comes to Kaspar when he's been beaten and almost dies. He says that at the top of the mountain is death. An unusual way of looking at it.

The face above is Kaspar Hauser's. The acting style is of a performance art quality that reminds me of some of my own work in a way that I both like and dislike, as the behavior of the character, who is supposed to be raw, entering human society at a very late age in life, is not quite real. For a while, it feels too in between comedy and drama for me. But I guess after about a third of the film I start to simply enjoy it as comedy. And then I enjoy of the rest of the film because it's simply refreshing, doesn't take itself too seriously, and so I don't have to feel like I'm working at something the way I do when I (albeit fulfillingly) watch a Bergman film.

Here's another scene where Kaspar is surrounded by some uptight society people who seem to be looking at him as if under a microscope (this is one of the sad parts of the film, and the situation gets especially sad as we move towards the end).

A fun scene - a circus full of "Freaks," including Kaspar and an "Indian" guy named Hombrecito who I think is actually Filipino. A peaceful hippy playing his flute. Herzog was clearly making fun of the fact that they were supposed to be circus freaks when they were the really likeable people in the film.

Here's the logic guy again.

I need to watch more Herzog.

STRANGER THAN PARADISE

STRANGER THAN PARADISE by Jim Jarmusch

This is a film whose simplicity and whimsicality make me happy every minute that I'm watching it.

"Stranger than Paradise" is a great reminder that if a film has people you like, enough interesting locations shot from interesting angles, a progression of events that makes sense to you, and human interactions that are generally positive, it can work. It doesn't have to have an elaborate plot or script.

This is the kind of movie that makes one want to make movies. Eva visits her cousin in NYC, from Hungary, for the first time. The larger throughline of events is simply that the two become friends after initial conflict of a subtle sort.

Eva's cousin and his friend follow her to Cleveland after she leaves his apartment in NYC. She's happy to see them, and they end up taking her to Florida for a vacation. That's it. What makes the simplicity even more enjoyable is that it's flawed simplicity. Jarmusch tries to create a little conflict toward the end when Eva and her cousin take the two beds in the hotel, forcing the friend to take the cot. Yet throughout that 'conflict' and a few more that ensue, it doesn't feel like the actors want to be even that mean towards each other. Which adds to the whimsy.

PS One of the best moments is when they discover that Eva is working at a hot dog stand when they get to Cleveland.

PPS The film reminds: if a film is directed elegantly, one can get away with a lot. Its simple but strong visual language can easily be admired above great dialogue.

GERTRUD

GERTRUD by Carl Theodor Dreyer


originally posted 2/1/11. this is edited/updated 10/10/16.

This is an important film. Carl Theodor Dreyer thought deeply about women and their perspectives.

Gertrud's character can be disturbing because she's so traditional in her role as the "woman," the "wife," the object of beauty. Her depression, her understanding of love-seeking as the only purpose of existence, the way she experiences primarily conflict with men's interest in their life's work, are all real and haunting, most deeply expressed in the song she sings, accompanied on the piano by her young lover. 

Tragic is the scene where she talks with a previous lover, who had idealized her as the love of his life. He informs her of how her present lover has "dragged her name through the mud" by speaking of her as a sexual conquest publicly, at a party held by a woman of ill repute. He weeps while struggling to explain the impact this has had on him.

"Gertrud" represents what happens to women who are particularly willful, not in a position to utilize their intelligence, perhaps motherless. From the relationship with her younger lover - the solution to her haunting malaise - to endless talks with varying men about their varied feelings, to her eventual desire for solely education and solitude, this film speaks volumes about women from a more complete angle than we typically see.

Like with many great films, even while we are forced to wade slowly into the viscosity of its situation toward an understanding of its characters, we are left with a feeling of profound truth in the end.