Werner Herzog – A Guide for the Perplexed: Conversations with Paul Cronin

The father of Jacob Wein, who played Benjamin, gave me a book of Jewish legends in which I found the story of the “unknown just.” In every generation, so the legend goes, there are born among the Jews thirty-six men who God has chosen to bear the burden of the world’s suffering, and to whom he has granted the privilege of martyrdom. These men are i

My original idea was to go to the southern Sahara and shoot a science-fiction story involving aliens and ancient astronauts from the planet Uxmal in the Andromeda Nebula who arrive on Earth with a camera and film the planet and its inhabitants. They want to prepare a report for folks back home,

It doesn’t matter that so many of the stories are implausible and most of the libretti are bad. Many plots aren’t even within the calculus of probability; it would be like winning the lottery jackpot five consecutive times. Yet when the music is playing, no explanations are required; primordial feelings suddenly reverberate within us. The stories m

Game in the Sand is about four children and a rooster. During shooting I had the feeling things were moving out of control; the boys involved in the filming became violent, and I did nothing to stop them. When I look back, the film should probably not have been made at all, though I did incorporate elements of it into Signs of Life, when Meinhard w

The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner was originally an hour long, but the television executives asked me to cut it down to exactly forty-four minutes and ten seconds so it would fit in their schedule. I never felt I was compromising anything by editing the film down to that length. Filmmaking is a craft, and as far as I’m concerned being a craft

When the hero shows up he always appears out of nowhere, riding on horseback, and when he leaves he disappears into the landscape, moving anonymously towards the horizon. There’s a vagueness about where he comes from and where he’s heading. All these things point to some deep-rooted, inherent principles that have to do with nomadic versus sedentary

Everything we’re forced to learn at school we quickly forget, but the things we set out to learn ourselves – to quench a thirst – are never forgotten, and inevitably become an important part of our existence.

Being tossed about on the waves is the very nature of filmmaking, a state of affairs only an amateur would whine about.

What I like about film is that you never immediately know what has been shot. When I feel in my guts we have the best we can possibly get, I stop. I don’t want to be able to push a button and check there and then what we’ve been working on. This is why you won’t find video-assist monitors on my set. I feel the same way about dailies, which I always