The Unprecedented Defence of the Fortress Deutschkreuz (1967)

Dir: WERNER HERZOG

Country: WEST GERMANY

The Unprecedented Defence of the Fortress Deutschkreuz is a short fourteen minute film written, directed, and produced by Bavaria’s finest filmmaker Werner Herzog. It was his third film, following on from his debut short Herakles (1962) and the mysterious and totally obscure Game in the Sand (1964). The latter is a film that Herzog has consistently refused to distribute, and will almost certainly remain hidden, owning to subject matter that still leaves the director disturbed. Fortress Deutschkreuz was Herzog’s first attempt at fiction, and as such it can be seen as something of a dress rehearsal for his first feature film Signs of Life which would follow in 1968. Both films explore the psychology of warfare, as the protagonists do battle with imaginary enemies. Signs of Life benefited tremendously from its beautiful Crete locations, brought vividly to monochrome life by the cinematography of Thomas Mauch, and the brilliantly unhinged performance of Peter Brogle as the brittle fantasist Stroszek. Fortress Deutschkreuz by contrast is still a little uneven and crude in places and the quality of the transfer I viewed does not aid its cause. However it does set up a satirical attitude to warfare that Herzog would develop and refine throughout his career.

No One Will Play With Me (1976)

Dir: WERNER HERZOG

Country: WEST GERMANY

This unusual and obscure little film from Werner Herzog emerged in between his two feature films The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (1974) and Heart of Glass (1976). The former is quite rightly lauded as one of Herzog’s finest achievements, and introduced the world to the bizarre talents of the non-professional actor Bruno S. The latter was a challenging fable of prophecy and apocalypse, a highly stylised and visionary film in which the director famously hypnotised the majority of the cast members. It seems odd that Herzog would return to the short film at this stage in his career. His previous short film was made seven years before and was entitled Precautions Against Fanatics (1969), and in that time he had achieved his international breakthrough with feature films like Aguirre: Wrath of God (1972), the aforementioned Kaspar Hauser, and critically acclaimed documentaries such as Land of Silence and Darkness (1971) and The Great Ecstasy of the Woodcarver Steiner (1974), both of which were made for West German television, but achieved wider distribution due to the directors new found fame.

Herakles (1962)

Dir: WERNER HERZOG
Country: WEST GERMANY

This short nine minute film would be totally insignificant were it not for the fact that it marked the debut to filmmaking of Werner Herzog. The barmy Bavarian was a mere twenty years old when he wrote, directed, produced, and edited this somewhat amateurish effort. It is fair to say that Herakles was an exercise; an experiment on Herzog’s part to see if he could actually make a film. But even at this early stage Herzog’s decision to shoot on 35mm film shows that he had ambitions that far exceeded the humble nature of this production. But Herakles was an instructive lesson, especially for a young man who largely existed in a world without cinematic reference points, and whose influences were extremely limited. In this film Herzog explores the art of editing, and although Herakles is little more than an editorial exercise, it does contain a few images that will be of interest to Herzog enthusiasts. 

The Telephone Box (1972)

Dir: ANTONIO MERCERO
Country: SPAIN

AKA:
La Cabina

Original Transmission Date - 13/12/1972

The Telephone Box was a short film made for Spanish television in 1972. Its origins are humble, but its status as a cult film is incontestable. It is incredibly unusual for a short film, especially one from a director who is still largely unknown outside his native Spain, to acquire such a following. It would almost be impossible for it to happen now, but in the early 1970’s when short films were often screened as support features (quite often they were educational or public safety films) and on late night television, the chances were slightly improved. The majority of these films were seen once, left an indelible and haunting impression, and were then the subject of nostalgia, word-of-mouth, and ultimately a long (and often fruitless) quest for a second view or even ownership. The relative obscurity and unavailability of The Telephone Box has been of paramount importance in its development as a cult object. The significance of the film has grown in proportion to its descent into the gloomy netherworld of a distribution limbo. This isn’t entirely the only reason for its cult status however; one of the key signifiers of a cult film is generic hybridity, and The Telephone Box has this in abundance. The film opens as a kind of anarchic surreal comedy, before subtly shifting into a realm of puzzlement and mystery, and then concluding in outright horror. Three generic shifts in thirty-five minutes may seem unwieldy and problematic, but the filmmakers pull it of with such confidence, that the cumulative effect is quite devastating.

Three Stephen King Short Films

I’m a major enthusiast for, and follower of, Stephen King’s remarkable Dark Tower saga, and to commemorate the UK release of The Wind through the Keyhole, the latest chapter in this ever evolving mythology, I thought I’d write a piece dedicated to the more shadowy and indistinct corners of the King filmography. The Stephen King short film is a phenomenon all of its own, but one that generally exists below the radar due to the fact that the films are almost entirely the work of students and/or passionate amateurs. All of these intriguing (and to be fair often quite amateurish) efforts are known by the collective term Dollar Babies. For those unfamiliar with this term and the ideology behind it, here is a quote from Mr. King himself;

“77 was the year young filmmakers - college students, for the most part - started writing me about the stories I'd published (first in Night Shift later in Skeleton Crew), wanting to make short films out of them. Over the objections of my accountant, who saw all sorts of possible legal problems, I established a policy which still holds today. I will grant any student filmmaker the right to make a movie out of any short story I have written (not the novels, that would be ridiculous), so long as the film rights are still mine to assign. I ask them to sign a paper promising that no resulting film will be exhibited commercially without approval, and that they send me a videotape of the finished work. For this one-time right I ask a dollar. I have made the dollar-deal, as I call it, over my accountant's moans and head-clutching protests sixteen or seventeen times as of this writing..” *

Two Films by Davide Melini

THE PUZZLE (2008)
THE SWEET HAND OF THE WHITE ROSE (2010)

Dir: DAVIDE MELINI
Country: SPAIN

I recently received a pleasant communiqué from Italian writer/producer/director Davide Melini directing me towards two of his short films The Puzzle (2008) and the beautifully titled The Sweet Hand of the White Rose (2010). The former runs for just under five minutes, and the latter for just under seventeen, so I felt it was the least I could do to spare twenty-two minutes in the service of independent filmmaking. Melini informs me that he worked with Dario Argento on the abominated monstrosity The Mother of Tears (2007); for those who have never heard of Mr. Argento, he made a couple of good films in the 1970’s which he has since lived off. Obviously Mr. Melini hasn’t read my review of The Mother of Tears, otherwise he may well have chosen to omit that nugget of information. But I’m not entirely anti-Argento, and I won’t hold it against Davide that he had the misfortune of working with such an amateur. His five minute short The Puzzle actually does have a notable thing in common with recent Argento movies; its story is so slight as to be non-existent and it makes about as much sense as sugar on chips. Melini  takes a writing credit for this effort, and to be fair, I think he’s being overly generous to himself. There is just a single line of dialogue, delivered unconvincingly  by actress Cachito Noguera, and apart from this the film almost entirely consists of flashy and self-conscious stylistic trickery.

Guest Review - Invocation Of My Demon Brother (1969)

Dir: KENNETH ANGER
Country: USA

My introduction to the works of Kenneth Anger began when I saw Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954) [on the Channel 4 show Midnight Underground.] My first thoughts were “What the hell is this?” Bizarre imagery set to classical music, with a guy who had impressively long fingernails. In the pre-internet days, a trawling of the library uncovered a book featuring underground filmmakers. This led to my quest to track down as many of his works as possible, which was not easy in the days before multi-region DVD players. Most of the copies of Anger’s films were American, but eventually, through the classified ads in a magazine, a, cough, bootlegged copy of nine of his short film were mine, albeit on a Maxell C180.

Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe (1980)

Dir: LES BLANK
Country: USA

The Criterion Collection’s DVD of Burden of Dreams (1982) is an excellent package offering a wealth of important contextual information. This includes commentary tracks from directors Werner Herzog and Les Blank, Blank’s informative and absorbing diary of his time in the Peruvian jungle shooting his documentary, a lengthy retrospective interview with Herzog, and most priceless of all a short 20 minute documentary made by Blank in 1980 called Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe. Any release of short documentary material either by or about Herzog is a mini event in itself, and due to the films content and its title this has always been an exotic and long sought after item for those seeking out Herzog related material. Herzog’s militant attitude to filmmaking is given an opportunity to flourish in this short piece which was filmed during one of numerous breaks in the fragmented and troubled production of Fitzcarraldo (1982). At some point in the late 1970’s Herzog made the bold assertion that he would eat his shoe if young filmmaker Errol Morris succeeded in his quest to make a film. This bet was both an inspiration to Morris and an example of Herzog’s attitude to the importance of individuals battling the odds to achieve their vision. Naturally Morris succeeded and the film opens with Herzog flying in to attend a screening of Gates of Heaven (1978) and to make good on his shoe eating bet.

La Soufriere (1977)

Dir: WERNER HERZOG
Country: WEST GERMANY

The subtitle to this short thirty minute documentary from Werner Herzog is 'waiting for an inevitable catastrophe'. Within that statement lies an aspect of Herzog’s approach to cinema that has helped to create a mythology of reckless risk taking, a sense that danger is a fundamental aspect in his never ending search for new images. Although an impression of catastrophe is not inevitable in Herzog’s cinema, there is always an echo within the frame of the extremities and hardships undertaken to achieve the finished product. More so than any other filmmaker, the act of filmmaking itself becomes an essential aspect to understanding the fictional world Herzog creates. The same idea can be usefully applied to his documentaries - but La Soufriere is surely the one in which the spectre of death and destruction looms most palpably in every frame. In late 1976 Herzog along with his two cameramen Jorg Schmidt-Retwein and Edward Lachman travelled to the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe, an island that had been evacuated due to the imminent explosion of the volcano La Soufriere. However a handful of peasants had remained on the island, despite claims by volcanologists that to do so would mean certain death. Intrigued by this attitude to impending death Herzog was determined to interview these men to get a better understanding of their cavalier approach to life.

The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner (1974)

Dir: WERNER HERZOG

Country: WEST GERMANY

aka:
Die große Ekstase des Bildschnitzers Steiner

This magnificent documentary is a both a study of sporting endeavour and a journey into the psychology of a man willing to risk his very existence to attain his life long dream of flight. The Swiss ski jumper/flier Walter Steiner is probably Werner Herzog’s perfect protagonist. Steiner is an exceptional and introverted figure, a man on the edge of the world, who lives a life of contrasting and conflicting emotions. On the one hand Steiner lives a simple rural life in which he spends his days quietly carving objects out of wood. He appears unassuming and shy, somewhat awkward and self conscious in front of the camera, although when left to his thoughts is surprisingly eloquent and poetic. Herzog deftly emphasises the mundane aspects of Steiner’s life which allows for a far greater impact when we see Steiner launching himself at ridiculous speeds into the alpine skies and clearing 170 meters. The film opens with this image - a beautiful but eerie shot of Steiner in slow motion, his mouth agape, the mountainous backdrop still and implacable and the ethereal music of Popol Vuh giving the shot a resonance and grandeur that slips it into the realm of the ecstatic.

Contact (2009)

Dir: JEREMIAH KIPP
Country: USA

It is not very often that I get the opportunity to travel down some of the smaller intersections of The Celluloid Highway. Along these ill lit and creepy passages and avenues lies the domain of the short film. The short remains a vital means of expression, a space in which to experiment and to scratch onto the celluloid an artists personality. To view the short as simply a calling card or as a means to an end is to do a disservice to a delicate and challenging form of storytelling which needs to communicate its themes and message in a much clearer and concise manner. I was recently invited to view the latest offering from independent filmmaker Jeremiah Kipp, a short ten minute movie entitled Contact. With limited budgets comes the necessity to learn all aspects of the filmmaking process and Kipp has done just that. With experience in writing, directing and producing, Kipp’s most notable credit to date was as assistant director on I Sell the Dead (2008).