German film maker Werner Herzog’s death row documentary Into the Abyss explores capital punishment through interviews with convicted killers, their victims’ families, and members of the Texas criminal justice system. “There is no melodrama, just intimate conversations, but you shed tears,” says S. Anand of Konangal Film Society. In an interview, Herzog calls it ‘a gaze into the abyss of the human soul’. Anand’s new book in Tamil, Herzog , on the German master captures many such interviews, where he talks about his craft.
In another book Kobayashi, Anand discusses the Japanese master Masaki Kobayashi. It features Joan Mellon’s interview with Kobayashi from the book Voices from the Japanese Cinema along with information about his films. Published by Tamizhini, both books were released at the Chennai Book Fair recently. Anand has taken it upon himself to make literature about the masters of cinema of the world available to the Tamil reading public. “There are hardly any books in Tamil on the world masters. These books will serve as a guide to young film makers or anyone who is interested in good cinema.” These two books are a part of series he plans to write on top 50 film makers. Anand’s passion for world cinema has led him to undertake this mission.
He chose Herzog and Kobayashi because they deal with humanism. Kobayashi, a contemporary of Akira Kurosawa, records history. He was highly critical of Japan’s feudal past and the way Japanese army conducted the war. “The film maker was shunned by the Japanese Government. Though Japan itself wants to forget the aftermath of World War II, he documents it in his films. I hope the book inspires our young film makers to record our history, stories, and movies,” he says.
Anand’s book discusses Kobayashi’s films Harakiri (1962) and Samurai Rebellion (1967) that expose the brutal Samurai tradition and feudalism that controlled the poor. He questions the blind obedience of the Samurais, the treatment of women (used for barter)…
He calls Werner Herzog a living master. “His films bring together the German classic tradition with the contemporary avant-garde film making,” he explains. In one of his documentaries Encounters at the End of the World , Werner Herzog goes to Antarctica to record its people and places. “There’s footage where a penguin marches in the wrong direction, walking to certain death in the barren interior of the continent. The film maker says the rule of the nature is to let the penguin go. The shot stays on in your mind for a long time,” says Anand
Herzog made many films outside Germany about the marginalised. The film maker often mentions that he is willing to go deep down to hell to get a movie done, says Anand. “His films on the burning wells of Iraq convey the havoc wreaked by war on people and ecology. In one of the films, the Aborigines protest and stop bulldozers from digging their land for oil and minerals.” Herzog’s film Fitzcarraldo , made in 1979 portrays a would-be rubber baron who is determined to transport a steamship over a steep hill in order to access a rich rubber territory. “The film famously involved moving a 320-ton steamship over a hill. Herzog ensured that he did that though it took him five years to complete the film.”
The books are available at New Century Book House bookshops (0422 -2380554) and Vijaya Pathippagam (0422-2394614)
