the horror!
by douglas messerli
Werner
Herzog (writer and director) Auch Zwerge
haben klein angefangen (Even Dwarfs
Started Small) / 1970, USA 1971
Presumably
the title of Werner Herzog’s 1970 film refers to the fact that even “little
people” began their lives as babies and young children, despite the deformity
of their bodies in their
adult life. And
that fact, in turn, suggests that they should be treated with equal respect
with all others. Clearly that is not the case upon the volcanic island of Lanzarote
in the Canary Islands where the action takes place.
We have no idea why the dwarfed individuals
are being held there, nor who, in fact, is confining them, forcing them to
water the plants and feed the several chickens, the sow and her piglets, and
the pet monkey. Most of the asylum-folk are apparently taken into the city on a
weekly voyage, and there is some evidence of their being educated, since
another little person is described as the “instructor.”
We also know very little about why the
group of 8 individuals (along with two blind little people) who, on the day
most of Herzog’s narrative occurs, have been forced to remain home. We can only
imagine, particularly, after their rebellion, that these few have been left
behind as a kind of punishment. Several times they claim they get more
attention by behaving badly than being good.
In between their often frightening but
always fascinating antics, they threaten the instructor, pour over the
instructor’s magazines filled with pictures of naked women, and gasp over one
of their members’ insect collection for which she has created dresses, hats, and
other clothes. Mostly, throughout this madness, they simply laugh
uncontrollably, delighted by their wicked spree.
By the end of the day, the instructor has
gone mad and abandoned the institution, lecturing a leafless branch for
pointing at him. We know from the very first scene that eventually the asylum
director did return, order was restored and that the least active of their
group—who, it appears,
is half-witted
and merely reports back what the others say—is blamed for the melee, or, at
least, expected to explain it, something he refuses to do.
Yes, this is a parable, in part, of
ostracism, of the extremes those who have been rejected by political and social
systems will go to be heard, even if their fists can only pound against
impenetrable doors, wherein, as in one instance, one has lost her shoe.
Herzog’s use of wonderful South African native music makes that quite clear.
But Herzog also seems determined to show us something far more profound about
human experience.
As
in so many of his films, Herzog reveals the instinctual chaos of both animal
and human nature, but then there is also our innate fascination in observing
it. And with actors such as these little people, Klaus Kinski, and Bruno S.,
Herzog is almost always immediately able to get right to the heart of things: “the horror, the horror.” In that sense, we might argue that
Herzog is kind of a later-day Joseph Conrad with of touch of Jack London in
him.
Los Angeles, May
8, 2016
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