Latest news with #Fitzcarraldo
Times
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
Burden of Dreams (1982) review — the engrossing Fitzcarraldo backstory
The opening titles of Les Blank's behind-the-scenes documentary boast that it's 'starring' the director Werner Herzog. A documentary? Starring? And yet that's exactly what you get in this gruelling and engrossing Fitzcarraldo backstory. The production is a litany of disasters. Jason Robards, the lead actor, exits with dysentery, followed by his co-star Mick Jagger. The Robards replacement Klaus Kinski is furious with the remote Peruvian location, hissing, 'You can't escape this f***ing stinking camp!' Bulldozers break down. Ships don't work. City sex workers are bizarrely bussed in for the male crew to neutralise the possibility of intimate, and thus culturally sensitive, relations with local indigenous women. Throughout all this there's Herzog, captain of the ship (he remains on the film's steamship when it runs aground),
The Guardian
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Burden of Dreams review – on-location account of Werner Herzog's Fitzcarraldo is a gruelling delight
In 1982, film-maker Les Blank released this sombre, thoughtful, quietly awestruck documentary account of Werner Herzog's crazy sisyphean struggle in a remote and dangerous Peruvian jungle location, making his extraordinary drama Fitzcarraldo, which came out the same year. Fitzcarraldo was Herzog's own bizarre and brilliant story idea, crazily amplifying and exaggerating a case from real life. Early 20th-century opera enthusiast Brian Sweeney Fitzgerald, played with straw-hair and mad blue eyes by Klaus Kinski, goes into the rubber trade to make enough money to realise his dream of building an opera house in the Peruvian port town of Iquito; he works out that the steamship needed to transport materials can only be brought into the required stretch of water by dragging it across land between two tributaries. This is a crazy, magnificent and operatic obsession, more grandiose than anything that could be presented on stage, for which he will need Indigenous peoples as slave labour to haul the ship. By playing these tribes his Caruso records on an old gramophone player, he persuades them he is a white god who must be obeyed. In the original case, an entrepreneur (called Carlos Fermin Fitzcarrald) reportedly transported a 300-ton ship across land by disassembling it into a couple of dozen pieces; Herzog insisted on shifting the ship whole, and moreover insisted on filming these scenes in the remote interior, not near Iquito itself – which would have been far easier and probably would have looked the same. In the jungle, the cast and crew suffered the agonies of early settlers and colonial adventurers: illness, discomfort, poison-arrow attacks and, above all, mind-bending boredom as the weather meant that nothing could be done for months at a time. Perhaps no other period movie in history has so closely duplicated the subject matter in its gruelling shoot. Herzog's original lead casting, Jason Robards, dropped out with amoebic dysentery and Mick Jagger, who was to play the innocent sidekick, evidently saw what an ordeal he was in for and dropped out as well, citing the need to record the album Tattoo You. Herzog surrendered to the inevitable and cast his old frenemy-slash-muse Kinski; but the mercurial hothead-genius was naturally hurt at not being first choice and made everyone's life hell with arguments and complaints. And it is difficult to get your head around the thought of what it must have been like for the cast and crew just waiting, waiting, waiting for Herzog to decree that, yes, we can shoot. This is a strangely subdued documentary, recorded as it was more or less contemporaneously with the film itself but which doesn't fully show the nightmarish things which were soon to become legendary. (Fax Bahr and George Hickenlooper's 1991 film Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse, about the horror of making Coppola's Apocalypse Now in the late 70s, had the advantage of time and gave us far more juicy and scary material.) Herzog himself is shown talking mournfully about his disasters: the light-plane crashes that are supposed to have critically injured some people and paralysed another. (But these people are not named. What actually happened?) We do however see the darkness and intensity of Herzog himself as he descants on how much he loves but also hates the jungle in that unmistakable voice of his. 'The birds don't sing … they just screech in pain. Theirs is the harmony of overwhelming collective murder … I love it against my better judgment.' Amazingly, Herzog always looks in pretty good shape, considering what he's gone through, and put others through. His burden of dreams is borne with some style. It's a good curtain-raiser to the film itself. Burden of Dreams is in UK cinemas from 23 May.
Times
20-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
Annie Ernaux and the bourgeosie's ‘extraordinary erotic capabilities'
'I have always wanted to write as if I would be gone when the book was published,' Annie Ernaux once admitted. 'To write as if I were about to die.' If by that she meant writing with brazen candour, she has succeeded. The most intimate human experiences — grief, greed, fear, sickness and lust, along with other kinds of private 'primordial savagery' — are laid bare throughout the prolific French author's works, sometimes in shudderingly explicit detail, and The Possession is no exception. It is the latest in a series of reprints of her books from the independent publisher Fitzcarraldo. The deadly sin that this particular memoir focuses on is envy, with Ernaux reluctantly handing over an ex-boyfriend to an anonymous new woman. 'The strangest
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Rooney and Kate Mara Are Codependent Twins in Werner Herzog's ‘Bucking Fastard' First Look
In a film sure to break the internet, real-life sisters Rooney and Kate Mara are playing infamous tabloid twins Joan and Jean Holbrooke for Werner Herzog's buzzy 'Bucking Fastard.' Maverick auteur Herzog writes and directs 'Bucking Fastard' based on the true story of the Holbrooke sisters who lived on the fringes of society and spoke in their own twisted language, shared the same dreams, and even loved the same man. Domhnall Gleeson and Orlando Bloom co-star in the feature, which is a sales title from HanWay Films. More from IndieWire In Cannes Premiere 'The President's Cake,' a 9-Year-Old Is Forced to Tribute Saddam Hussein on His Birthday - Watch Clip Tom Cruise Reveals How They Shot the Craziest Stunt in 'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning' 'Bucking Fastard' is set in Ireland, where the sisters are assigned a government-issued social worker (Gleeson) in an attempt to help them adapt to modern life. The official logline teases that Joan and Jean begin digging a tunnel through a mountain range to find an imaginary land where true love is possible; Bloom plays their shared ex-lover, Gareth Maloney. Herzog announced that 'Bucking Fastard' will 'complete a circle in an operatic triptych' with his two prior films, 'Fitzcarraldo' and 'Grizzly Man.' Herzog said of the sisters, played by both Maras, 'We cannot see the world as Jean and Joan Holbrooke see it, but we do see how the world reacts to them — through the courts and the press, through those that want to help and those who want to use them, through the eyes of beasts both tame and wild, and even through their own echoes in the core of the earth.' Kate Mara recently told IndieWire while promoting hit comedy 'Friendship' that she was skeptical over whether or not 'Bucking Fastard' would even get made. To Mara, the project seemed 'too good to be true,' especially as her debut acting alongside sister Rooney Mara. 'I have loved Werner Herzog's films ever since I saw 'Burden of Dreams,'' Mara said. 'I just love his passion for film and his dedication to it, and how seriously he takes it. I just think it's so rare and beautiful, and he's such a brilliant writer and so truthful and honest and so unique and peculiar. He wrote me and my sister a beautiful letter asking us to be in this about a year ago. We were both so thrilled because we have been wanting to work together for a while, but nothing made sense. This one was immediately a no-brainer, and then it just so happened that it was these sisters who are so connected that they speak in unison and they dream the same dreams. It was so perfectly presented and the script was so special, and odd, so it's an obvious thing to say yes to. But it kind of felt like it would never happen just because it it was like too good to be true.' Mara added, 'It was the most special experience working with Werner, who was wild and fantastical. He's everything you want him to be. He just knows exactly what he wants. And then working with my sister was equally as much of a dream.' 'Bucking Fastard' is produced by Clara Wu Tsai, Ariel Leon Isacovitch, Agnes Chu, Kieran Corrigan, Emanuele Moretti, and Andrea Bucko. The film is a sales title that will be presented at the Cannes marketplace. Check out the first look image above. Best of IndieWire A History of Unsimulated Sex Scenes in 18 Cannes Films, from 'Mektoub' to 'Antichrist' to 'Caligula' Guillermo del Toro's Favorite Movies: 56 Films the Director Wants You to See 'Song of the South': 14 Things to Know About Disney's Most Controversial Movie
Extra.ie
06-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Extra.ie
Domhnall Gleeson joins star-studded cast in upcoming Werner Herzog film
Domhnall Gleeson has joined a star-studded cast for a new production which was largely shot in Dublin. The About Time actor stars alongside sisters Kate and Rooney Mara in the cast of the upcoming Werner Herzog film Bucking Fastard. The production, which completed filming last weekend, was shot in Dublin, Sligo, and Slovenia and is expected to be shown to buyers at the Cannes Film Festival this month. Domhnall Gleeson has joined a star studded cast for a new production currently shooting in Dublin. Pic: John Phillips/BAFTA/Getty Images for BAFTA The film, which is written and directed by Werner Herzog, is being produced by Ariel Leon Isacovitch and Agnes Chu along with Andrea Bucko and Emanuele Moretti of Cobalt Sky Motion Picture Group, and Clara Wu Tsai. Bucking Fastard marks the first time the sisters have worked together, with the film being based on the true story of inseparable twin sisters Joan and Jean, who live on the fringes of society. The film also stars actor Orlando Bloom who plays their rowdy ex-lover Gareth Mulroney, while Gleeson will portray Timothy, their government-issued social worker who is trying to help them adapt to modern life after the two become tabloid sensations. The About Time actor stars alongside sisters Kate and Rooney Mara in the cast of the upcoming Werner Herzog film Bucking Fastard. Pic: Getty Images Speaking about the film, Herzog said: 'Bucking Fastard is a film that, for me, completes a circle in an operatic triptych with my previous films, Fitzcarraldo and Grizzly Man. 'We cannot see the world as Jean and Joan Holbrooke see it, but we do see how the world reacts to them – through the courts and the press, through those that want to help and those who want to use them, through the eyes of beasts both tame and wild, and even through their own echoes in the core of the earth.' Two-time Oscar nominee Rooney has previously filmed in Ireland, having starred in The Secret Scripture directed by Jim Sheridan. The film also stars actor Orlando Bloom who plays their rowdy ex-lover Gareth Mulroney, while Gleeson will portrays Timothy, their government-issued social worker who is trying to help them adapt to modern life after the two become tabloid sensations. Pic: Matt Winkelmeyer/FilmMagic Speaking on her time shooting here, she remarked to the Times: 'I felt completely at home in Ireland. Except that doing the Irish accent was hard. It's a hard accent to master and one that – even I can hear – often ends up being done horribly. Doing it was terrifying. Especially being on set with real Irish people.' Rooney most recently featured in the Orion Pictures drama Women Talking from writer-director Sarah Polley, while Kate is best known for starring in the FX series Class of '09 and is up next in the sci-fi thriller The Astronaut. Eagle eyed fans had previously spotted the sisters shooting on Dublin's Capel Street.
