If you're going to watch this, I strongly recommend you allot time for the DVD version with Herzog's commentary. It adds some warmth and a lot of insight into what on the surface could be seen as a simple film wherein the characters don't change despite the fact that their environs do.
Yep another indictment of the impersonal and imposing modern world and those that it plows under. At the same time, it had a strange flavor, reminiscent of being cursed at in English by a non-native speaker. Perturbing on one level, but sort of playful in its twisted delivery.
On the first watching of the film, I knew nothing about Bruno S. the person...but did find him a bit of a miscreant. Later on we learn that "Stroszek" serves as somewhat of a biopic, strung together with flotsam and jetsam from Herzog's own travels and travails. Herzog's casting is beyond odd, and for that I am grateful...others may be put off.
But part of Herzog's anachronistic/anarchic approach is to take non-actors and place them in a state of inaction. Through this process, we get something more like life than cinema, and yet strangely unlike either. The spiral downwards of Bruno feels inevitable, and is nowhere near enjoyable to watch. The film is frustrating to me, as Bruno remains no more than a spectator in the debacle of his own life. He's a complex simpleton, refusing to march to the beat of his own conundrum.
We are promised a false rebirth, with the visit to the preemie birth ward...but Bruno spent too much time wrapped up and strangled by his umbilical Berlin cord. The move to America finds rifles growing like corn stalks, and one even takes root in our anti-hero's hands.
The film feels rife with symbolism, but I wonder how much of that is a fact that Herzog himself is a magnet for fools' gold. If you, like myself prefer such esoteric elements over the coign of the silver screen, then this film should have enough rewards for you. But ultimately, I think you'll feel shortchanged.
The soundtrack however does deserve a favorable mention, the beauty of dilapidated sound is easier to appreciate than dilapidated surroundings for me. And whereas the musings of Bruno did not ring true for me, his homespun, junkyard music certainly did.
6/10
I look forward to seeing other Herzog films, but I'm starting to wonder if I (or you) should see them in any particular order. Again the commentary was a big plus, I'm impressed at the sort of improvisational movie-making Herzog guides.
Yep another indictment of the impersonal and imposing modern world and those that it plows under. At the same time, it had a strange flavor, reminiscent of being cursed at in English by a non-native speaker. Perturbing on one level, but sort of playful in its twisted delivery.
On the first watching of the film, I knew nothing about Bruno S. the person...but did find him a bit of a miscreant. Later on we learn that "Stroszek" serves as somewhat of a biopic, strung together with flotsam and jetsam from Herzog's own travels and travails. Herzog's casting is beyond odd, and for that I am grateful...others may be put off.
But part of Herzog's anachronistic/anarchic approach is to take non-actors and place them in a state of inaction. Through this process, we get something more like life than cinema, and yet strangely unlike either. The spiral downwards of Bruno feels inevitable, and is nowhere near enjoyable to watch. The film is frustrating to me, as Bruno remains no more than a spectator in the debacle of his own life. He's a complex simpleton, refusing to march to the beat of his own conundrum.
We are promised a false rebirth, with the visit to the preemie birth ward...but Bruno spent too much time wrapped up and strangled by his umbilical Berlin cord. The move to America finds rifles growing like corn stalks, and one even takes root in our anti-hero's hands.
The film feels rife with symbolism, but I wonder how much of that is a fact that Herzog himself is a magnet for fools' gold. If you, like myself prefer such esoteric elements over the coign of the silver screen, then this film should have enough rewards for you. But ultimately, I think you'll feel shortchanged.
The soundtrack however does deserve a favorable mention, the beauty of dilapidated sound is easier to appreciate than dilapidated surroundings for me. And whereas the musings of Bruno did not ring true for me, his homespun, junkyard music certainly did.
6/10
I look forward to seeing other Herzog films, but I'm starting to wonder if I (or you) should see them in any particular order. Again the commentary was a big plus, I'm impressed at the sort of improvisational movie-making Herzog guides.