FREE ON YOUTUBE (DU FINDEST DEN GANZEN FILM FREI AUF YOUTUBE) I have the following theory about Werner Herzog, that in none of his films does the acting matter. Better still, it's not PLAYED. Herzog finds actors who embody the essence of his characters. He studies this essence in film with the greatest possible intensity. Take Bruno S., the "star" of the early Herzog films. The son of a prostitute was locked away for over twenty years in a closed institution (according to Wikipedia). Although he was never crazy, as Herzog believes. Bruno is a stubborn man. A simple one with the charisma of a child. One who can move us. He IS Kaspar Hauser. He does not look at us. He looks through us. Can Bruno S. play other roles than Bruno S.? Probably not. Look at the bonus materials. Herzog pretends to have been criticized in Germany for exploiting Bruno S.. Is that true? Certainly. The story of Kaspar Hauser is real. He was found in 1928. He clasped the Bible and a letter. For twenty years a kidnapper held him prisoner in the cellar. Does that look familiar? A nice couple adopts him and he learns to read and write. And even playing the piano (the real Bruno plays - as we see in "Stroszek" - accordion). For Kaspar every day is a secret. "It dreamt me..." Herzog hardly distinguishes between reality and fiction. Faithfulness to facts does not interest him, only effect. No linear story is told. Instead we get impressions. Or insertions like the stork that picks the worm. Images that only indirectly have to do with Kaspar. It's never about solving Kaspar's secret. On the contrary; the secret is the very captivating thing about him! I still remember how my then colleague in the video store, Thomas Groh, was invited to an interview with Werner Herzog, Thomas was sooo nervous! How would Herzog react to his questions? One heard bad stories. One who imagined the inner life of the blind and dumb and dwarves. And of Kaspar. Personalities who are not the prisoners of these attributes. No, they are liberated people, thanks to these attributes! This is the world of Werner Herzog and Thomas was invited to enter it. We were all sooo nervous. Fortunately Herzog answered like a gentleman. In his nasal timbre. I myself have always understood his feature films in the same way as his documentaries. In the feature films he used actors as instruments. The way he found them. He documented her personality. In his greatest films like "Everyone for himself and God against all" the actor and figure are congruent. Duke Kaspar Hauser is a wonderfully lyrical film about man, who is probably the least lyrical himself. Kaspar enters a dream world (= our world). He escaped his reality, that of the cellar. Kaspar had never dreamed in the cellar. Of what? "Everyone for himself and God against everyone" summarizes Kaspar's thinking. A poor worm that dreams to fly. Just like all of us, don't we?
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