Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes (1972)
Directed by Werner Herzog

Film Review

Aguirre, the Wrath of God, Werner Herzog's best known and most celebrated film, is a portrait of obsession and insanity that is both mesmerising and utterly chilling.  The film marks the beginning of a legendary collaboration between Herzog and his lead actor Klaus Kinski, who would bring to life some of the more colourful characters in the director's oeuvre, in films such as Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht (1979) and Fitzcarraldo (1982). It is hard to imagine anyone better suited for the part of Aguirre than Kinski. The actor had originally envisaged playing his character as a more conventional raving madman, but Herzog was insistent that Aguirre be portrayed in a more restrained fashion, to convey the threat he posed in a more subtle and effective manner.

Under Herzog's typically rigorous direction, Kinski succeeds in creating one of the most memorable grotesques in his repertoire.  His Aguirre is a monomaniacal monster who is so absorbed by his ambitions, so confident in his self-belief that he fails to see the real dangers around him, so that inevitably he becomes the doomed leader of a suicide mission.  Parallels with other well-known historical figures (some quite recent) are painfully evident.

The film cost around 350 thousand dollars to make, which, even then, was a ludicrously small budget for such an ambitious undertaking.  It was shot in just five weeks in the Peruvian rainforest, an ordeal that called for meticulous planning and considerable initiative for a complex and highly demanding location shoot.  On its first release, the film won instant acclaim, both in American and Europe, and soon acquired a cult following.  It is now widely regarded as a masterpiece of German cinema, with many subsequent filmmakers (including Francis Ford Coppola) citing it as an inspiration in their work.

One of the strengths of the film is the way in which it is shot by cinematographer Thomas Mauch.  The jerky camera movements (a comparative novelty for this period) add to the realism and bring an unsettling sense of confinement.  The impression is that the conquistadors are caught in a trap, entirely at the mercy of unseen forces luring them to an inescapable doom.  Meanwhile, the stunningly photographed location, almost surreal in its serenity and natural splendour, provides a deeply ironic counterpoint to the hectic maelstrom of fear, treachery and suffering that seems to cloak the conquistadors.  These ill-fated explorers are blind to the beauty that surrounds them and see their expedition as a nightmare to be endured if they are to find their elusive city of gold.  It is not hard to read an anti-Capitalist, even anti-religious meaning into the film.

Film Synopsis

In 1560, a party of conquistadors led by Gonzalo Pizarro cross the Andes and undertake a hazardous journey through the Amazon rain forest in search of El Dorado, the fabled city of gold.  When the terrain becomes too difficult to cross on foot, a smaller group of about fifty men is sent on ahead on rafts, led by Don Pedro de Ursúa.  After a series of disasters, Ursúa gives the command for his men to return to the main party.  His second-in-command, Don Lope de Aguirre, refuses to comply and, robbing Ursúa of his authority, appoints another man, Don Fernando de Guzman, in his place.  With Aguirre now effectively in command and consumed by visions of his future greatness, the group resumes its perilous journey down the Amazon River.  What these hapless explorers find is not gold but gruesome death, delivered by Indians, the forces of nature and each other...