Aguirre, the Wrath of God

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Aguirre, the Wrath of God
U.S. Theatrical Release film poster
Directed by	Werner Herzog
Produced by	Werner Herzog
Written by	Werner Herzog
Starring	Klaus Kinski Helena Rojo Ruy Guerra Del Negro
Music by	Popol Vuh
Cinematography	Thomas Mauch
Editing by	Beate Mainka-Jellinghaus
Release date(s)	December 29, 1972 (West Germany)
Running time	100 min.
Country	West Germany
Language	English (German language version was dubbed)[1]
Budget	$370,000.[2]
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Aguirre, the Wrath of God (German: Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes) is an independent 1972 German film written and directed by Werner Herzog. Klaus Kinski stars in the title role. The soundtrack was composed and performed by Popol Vuh, a German progressive/ethno band that also contributed to other Herzog films. Arguably the director's most famous film, it was given an extensive arthouse theatrical release in the United States in 1977.

The story follows the travels of Lope de Aguirre, who leads a group of conquistadores down the Amazon River in South America in search of a lost city of gold (El Dorado). The film is in some ways similar to Joseph Conrad's 1902 novella Heart of Darkness, particularly in its basic narrative structure (a river voyage into the jungle), its association of the depths of the jungle with insanity, and its emphasis on the absurdity of colonialism.^{[citation needed]} Several critics have noted that Francis Ford Coppola's 1979 film Apocalypse Now, a movie based explicitly (but loosely) on the Conrad novella, was influenced also by Aguirre, as it contains seemingly deliberate visual "quotations" of Herzog's film.^{[3] [4] [5]} Coppola himself has noted, "Aguirre, with its incredible imagery, was a very strong influence. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention it."^[6]

Using a minimalist story and dialogue and the powerful acting of Kinski, the film creates a compelling vision of madness and folly, counterpointed by the lush but unforgiving Amazonian jungle. Although based loosely on what is known of the historical figure of Aguirre, the film's story line is, as Herzog acknowledged years after the film's release, a work of imagination. Some of the persons and situations may have been inspired by Gaspar de Carvajal's account of an earlier Amazonian expedition, but Carvajal was not present on the historical voyage represented in the film.

Contents 1 Synopsis 2 Production 3 Critical response 4 References 5 External links

[edit] Synopsis

In 1560, a thousand Spanish conquerors, and a score of captured Indians, march down from Quito in the Andes mountains into the jungle below. Under the command of Gonzalo Pizarro (Alejandro Repulles), the party's mission is to find El Dorado. The men, clad in full armor, pull cannons through narrow mountainous paths and hot, thickly humid jungle. After much difficulty, Pizarro orders a small expeditionary group of forty men to continue ahead by rafting a river. If they do not return to the main party within one week with news of what lies beyond, they will be considered lost. Pizarro chooses Don Pedro de Ursúa (Ruy Guerra) as the leader of the exploratory team. Don Lope de Aguirre (Klaus Kinski) is named second-in-command. He is accompanied by his young daughter, Florés (Cecilia Rivera).

One of the four rafts becomes separated from the others and gets caught in a violent whirlpool . A rescue team is unable to approach the raft until the following day. All of the men on board are discovered dead, murdered by Indians hiding in the forest. Ursúa insists the men be carried back to camp and given proper burials. Knowing this will slow down the expedition, Aguirre orders one of his men to shoot a cannon at the raft. The corpses are blown apart.

The remaining rafts drift slowly down the river. The explorers suffer under the intense heat. The still hidden Indians routinely attack them with hails of arrows from the jungle. The food begins to run out. As things get progressively more dangerous, Ursúa decides that their mission is hopeless and orders them to return to the main group. Desirous of power, Aguirre takes the opportunity to lead a rebellion against Ursúa, telling the men that untold riches await them ahead. Ursúa is shot. He is cared for by his mistress, Inez (Helena Rojo). Unsure of the loyalty of the soldiers, Aguirre sarcastically suggests the fat, lazy Don Fernando de Guzman (Peter Berling) as the token leader of the expedition. Aguirre proclaims Guzman the King of the New World, “dethroning” Philip II. A farcical trial of Ursúa results in his being sentenced to death, but Guzman surprises Aguirre by refusing to allow this to happen. Instead, Guzman grants Ursúa a pardon.

Aguirre is an oppressive ruler, so terrifying that few protest his leadership. Those that do complain are killed. Only Inez has the courage to speak out against him. Knowing that some of the soldiers are still loyal to Ursúa, Aguirre simply ignores her comments.

The expedition continues. An Indian is captured by the explorers, but when he expresses confusion at the sight of a bible, he and his wife are murdered at the insistence of the expedition's priest, Brother Gaspar de Carvajal (Del Negro). The group gapes in awe at a full-masted wooden ship perched in the highest branches of one of the tall trees. Guzman is found dead near the outhouse of one of the rafts. Taking advantage of Guzman's death, Aguirre proclaims himself leader. Ursúa is then taken ashore and hanged in the jungle. The group attacks an Indian village and many of the explorers are killed by spears. The distraught Inez walks into the jungle and disappears.

Aguirre is now the ruler of a group of slowly starving, hallucinating men. In an Indian attack, Aguirre’s daughter is killed with an arrow in her chest. The rest of Aguirre's soldiers die. Alone, he stands on a directionless, slowly circling raft. The raft becomes overrun by monkeys. The crazed Aguirre tells them: "I, the Wrath of God, will marry my own daughter and with her I will found the purest dynasty the world has ever seen. We shall rule this entire continent. We shall endure. I am the Wrath of God!"

[edit] Production

The idea for the film began when Herzog borrowed from a friend a book on historical adventurers. After reading the half page devoted to Lope de Aguirre, the filmmaker became inspired and immediately began to write a screenplay “in a frenzy”, which he completed in only two and a half days. Much of the script was written during a 200-mile bus trip with Herzog’s soccer team. He fabricated most of the plot details and characters, although he did use some historical figures in purely fictitious ways.^[7]

The film was made for $370,000, and filmed on location in the Peruvian rainforest, on the Amazon River tributaries of the Ucayali region. The film was shot in five weeks,^[7] following nine months' worth of pre-production planning. The film was shot in chronological order, as Herzog believed the film crew's progress on the river directly mirrored that of the explorers' journey in the story. All of the actors spoke their dialogue in English. The members of the cast and crew came from sixteen different countries, and English was the only common language among them. In addition, Herzog felt that shooting Aguirre in English would improve the film's chances for international distribution. The German version of the film was post synched after production was completed.^[1]

The low budget precluded the use of stunt men or elaborate physical effects. The cast and crew climbed up mountains, hacked through thick, steamy jungle, and rode ferocious Amazonian river rapids on rafts built by natives. At one point, a storm caused a river to flood, burying the film sets underneath several feet of water and destroying all of the rafts built for the film. This flooding was immediately incorporated into the story, as a sequence including a flood and subsequent rebuilding of rafts was shot.^[7]

On one occasion, irritated by the noise from a hut where cast and crew were playing cards, the explosive Klaus Kinski fired three shots at it, blowing the top joint off one extra's finger.^[7] Subsequently, Kinski started leaving the jungle location (over Herzog's refusal to fire a sound assistant), only changing his mind after Herzog threatened to shoot first Kinski and then himself. The latter incident has given rise to the legend that Herzog made Kinski act for him at gunpoint. However, Herzog has repeatedly debunked the claim during interviews, explaining he only verbally threatened Kinski in the heat of the moment, in a desperate attempt to keep him from leaving the set. The famous incident is parodied in Incident at Loch Ness, which Herzog co-wrote.

The camera used to shoot the film was stolen by Herzog from a school he attended. To obtain the monkeys utilized in the climactic sequence, Herzog paid several locals to trap 400 monkeys—he paid them half in advance and was to pay the other half on receipt. The trappers sold the monkeys to someone in Los Angeles or Miami, and Herzog came to the airport just as the monkeys were being loaded to be shipped out of the country. He pretended to be a veterinarian and claimed that the monkeys needed vaccinations before leaving the country. Abashedly, the handlers unloaded the monkeys, and Herzog loaded them into his jeep and drove away, used them in the shot they were required for, and released them afterwards into the jungle.^[7]

[edit] Critical response

The film received mostly positive critical notices upon release. Vincent Canby, writing in The New York Times, called it, "[A]bsolutely stunning...Mr. Herzog views all the proceedings with fixed detachment. He remains cool. He takes no sides. He may even be slightly amused. Mainly he is a poet who constantly surprises us with unexpected juxtapositions...This is a splendid and haunting work."^[8] In Time, Richard Schickel opined that "[Herzog] does the audience the honor of allowing it to discover the blindnesses and obsessions, the sober lunacies he quietly lays out on the screen. Well acted, most notably by Klaus Kinski in the title role, gloriously photographed by Thomas Mauch, Aguirre is, not to put too fine a point on it, a movie that makes a convincing claim to greatness."^[9] Time Out's Tony Rayns noted, "...each scene and each detail is honed down to its salient features. On this level, the film effectively pre-empts analysis by analysing itself as it proceeds, admitting no ambiguity. Yet at the same time, Herzog's flair for charged explosive imagery has never had freer rein, and the film is rich in oneiric moments."^[10]

The film's reputation through the years has continued to grow. J. Hoberman has written that Aguirre "is not just a great movie but an essential one...Herzog's third feature...is both a landmark film and a magnificent social metaphor."^[11] James Monaco's The Movie Guide described the film as "A stunning, terrifying exploration of human obsession descending into madness...a staggering experience that assaults the senses."^[12] Danny Peary wrote, "To see Aguirre for the first time is to discover a genuine masterpiece. It is overwhelming, spellbinding; at first dreamlike, and then hallucinatory."^[13] It has a 97% "Fresh" rating with only one negative review out of the 29 critics included on Rotten Tomatoes.^[14] Roger Ebert has added it to his list of "Great Movies",^[15] and in a 2002 Sight & Sound poll of critics and filmmakers on the best films ever made, Ebert listed it in his top ten.^[16] Aguirre was included in Time Magazine's "All Time 100 Best Films", compiled by Richard Schickel and Richard Corliss.^[17]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes at the Internet Movie Database
• Senses of Cinema article on Aguirre

Films directed by Werner Herzog and starring Klaus Kinski
Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972) • Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) • Woyzeck (1979) • Fitzcarraldo (1982) • Cobra Verde (1987) Retrospective: My Best Fiend (1999)

Cinema of Germany
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