- Fata Morgana (film)
Infobox Film | name = Fata Morgana
caption =
director =Werner Herzog
producer =Werner Herzog
writer =Werner Herzog
starring =Eugen Des Montagnes
music =Blind Faith
The Third Ear Band
Leonard Cohen
cinematography =Jörg Schmidt-Reitwein
editing =Beate Mainka-Jellinghaus
narrator =Lotte Eisner
distributor =
released = 1971
runtime = 79 min
language = German
budget =
imdb_id = 0067085"Fata Morgana" is a film by
Werner Herzog , shot in 1969, which captures mirages in the desert. Herzog describes the film as "a documentary shot by extraterrestrials from the Andromeda Nebula, and left behind."Fact|date=January 2008 The only narration consists of a recitation of the Mayan creation myth (thePopol Vuh ) byLotte Eisner , and text written by Herzog himself.Film critic David Thomson describes "Fata Morgana" as "extraordinary": " [The] desert is a model for mankind. The film is in three sections: the first showing an unpeopled, beautiful wasteland; the second introducing signs of human wreckage; and the third showing wretched vestiges of life. Totally imaginative, it is a legend of life at extremes that contrasts with "". Whereas
Stanley Kubrick has an all-powerful, riddle-making consciousness behind the universe, Herzog's creator is as fallible, quirky and uncertain as man himself."Fact|date=January 2008Production
The film was initially intended to be presented with a
science fiction narrative, casting the images as landscapes from another planet. This concept was abandoned as soon as filming began, but was realized in Herzog's later films "Lessons of Darkness " and "The Wild Blue Yonder ".cite book
last = Herzog
first = Werner
title = Herzog on Herzog
publisher =Faber and Faber
date=2001
pages = 303
isbn = 0-571-20708-1 ]Much of the film's footage consists of long
tracking shot s filmed by cameramanJörg Schmidt-Reitwein from the top of aVW bus with Herzog driving. The crew smoothed out the road themselves to prepare the shots.Herzog and the crew encountered many problems during the filming, most notably being imprisoned because cameraman Schmidt-Reitwein's name was similar to the name of a German mercenary who was hiding from the authorities and had recently been sentenced to death "
in absentia ".References
External links
* [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067085/ IMDB entry for Werner Herzog's "Fata Morgana"]
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