3: Werner Herzog: Difference between revisions

In this episode of "The Portal" podcast, Eric interviews legendary film-maker and director, [[Werner Herzog]] about his life in outlaw film-making before a live audience.

== Transcript ==

'''[00:00:03] Eric:''' <span title="00:00:03"> Hello. </span><span title="00:00:03">You've found The Portal. </span><span title="00:00:04">I'm your host Eric Weinstein, and this will be our second </span><span title="00:00:07">interview episode to be released. </span><span title="00:00:09">I think we have something really remarkable for you today because we </span><span title="00:00:11">have a human being who's led a life that even though he makes movies </span><span title="00:00:15">that are fictional, I would say that his actual nonfiction life is more </span><span title="00:00:19">interesting than any movie he's ever made. </span><span title="00:00:21">This is a person who has been shot on camera. </span><span title="00:00:24">A person who has stolen, who has forged and who's taught other </span><span title="00:00:28">filmmakers to steal and to forge. </span><span title="00:00:32">The person I'm talking about is Werner Herzog. </span><span title="00:00:34">Now, I first became aware of Werner Herzog when I was 16 and </span><span title="00:00:38">just entering the University of Pennsylvania, and a friend of mine </span><span title="00:00:41">said, you've got to see this movie. </span><span title="00:00:43">Fitzcarraldo I said, what is Fitzcarraldo? </span><span title="00:00:46">He says, if nothing else, it's a story about a man so possessed by an </span><span title="00:00:52">idée fixe that he drags a boat over a mountain in the jungle, in order </span><span title="00:00:58">to somehow build an opera house. </span><span title="00:01:00">And the whole thing sounded incredibly mad. </span><span title="00:01:03">And in fact, what was so interesting about this film was that the director </span><span title="00:01:07">actually had to do in real life what the crazy fictional character </span><span title="00:01:11">did inside of the storyline. </span><span title="00:01:15">This led me to a fascination with a today's interview subject Werner Herzog. </span><span title="00:01:20">This is a man who has lived so richly and so profoundly that I actually </span><span title="00:01:25">started to get a different idea about what he was doing as a film maker. </span><span title="00:01:29">The idea that I could not shake was, is that Werner Herzog needed to live </span><span title="00:01:33">so deeply and so profoundly that he had to make movies simply to justify </span><span title="00:01:39">what it meant to be Werner Herzog. </span><span title="00:01:42">Now, I've often asked myself this question, what is it the </span><span title="00:01:44">great generals do between wars? </span><span title="00:01:47">It's hard to imagine, let's say a Patton or a MacArthur in normal times, do they </span><span title="00:01:52">just sit around and open dry cleaners? </span><span title="00:01:55">Do they write essays for their local newspaper. </span><span title="00:01:59">What does a Winston Churchill do if there is no World War II to win? </span><span title="00:02:03">In such a situation I think it's very hard to come up with an answer, but I </span><span title="00:02:07">think that the best answer that I have is, is that these people would make movies. </span><span title="00:02:16">The following interview was recorded in front of a live audience. </span><span title="00:02:19">We joined the conversation in progress. </span><span title="00:02:22">May I just ask, first of all, before I try any theories of the kindness, do </span><span title="00:02:26">you see any clear organizing principle that unifies your output that is sort of </span><span title="00:02:34">subtle and non-obvious to your audience? </span>