Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World

Director: Werner Herzog

It is an indisputable fact that Werner Herzog is one of cinema's great masters and is one of the few (or is he the only?) directors who have managed to make both exceptional narrative and documentary films. Though the quality of his fictional films have been wildly uneven in the 21st century, few will argue the brilliant consistency of his documentaries. In his latest; Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World, Herzog offers movie audiences yet another absorbing documentary; this time on the internet; its history, it's wondrous potential and its darker side, which is often quite dark. In true Herzogian fashion, he pursues his subject with poetic insight and philosophic reflection; always questioning what he learns from his fascinating interviewees. While the world has taken the internet for granted, Herzog shows it has moved beyond its primary function as a conveyance for information, with both positive and negative implications.

Separated by chapters, Herzog's film addresses a wide range of topics concerning the internet's existence. In an opening scene, we hear UCLA computer science professor Leonard Kleinrock discuss the internet's genesis, which essentially took place in one of the university's labs in 1969. It is fascinating to see the primitive but very sturdy hardware that broadcast the first message, which inadvertently became "Lo." Much like Alexander Graham Bell's inaugural phone conversation, the first message sent on the internet was simple and presaged the emergence of a communication system with incredible reach. It is amusing to see the thin directory the first internet users consulted; an exclusive phone-book of web addresses. One interviewee reminisces about how the first online community was a group of people; all familiar with one another, who regarded mutual trust to be an article of faith.

Shortly thereafter, Herzog's film celebrates the internet's more positive aspects. In one such scene, we learn of an online game where participants were invited to help create complex molecules to aid cancer and AIDS research. The overwhelming, immediate response to the challenge is the film's ringing endorsement for the internet's communal, problem-solving potential.

Less inspiring is the succeeding chapter called Darkness; which recounts the grisly death of a teenage girl, which became fodder for internet trolls who found the horrific tragedy an occasion to subject the family to tasteless, disgusting humor and vile messages. As the mother and father discuss their child's death, their daughters sit solemnly in the foreground. As the father relates the story, the family was unable to obtain any factual information about the young woman's death but photos of her decapitated head found their way on to the internet, where they became morbid material for mass consumption. Unconscionable hate-mail followed soon after, which left the family bewildered and shaken. As we see in Herzog's framed shot of the family, the pain and suffering are very palpable. Herzog mentions his objection to sharing the more shockingly hateful messages the family received but we can easily infer their abominable content.

Less dark but still disquieting chapters delve into the security risks connectivity poses for ordinary citizens and governments alike. Herzog coaxes candid comments from a Sandia National Laboratory employee, who is reticent about a cyber-attack waged on the United States by the Chinese. Another subject, the infamous hacker Kevin Mitnick, shares a disturbing story about how he obtained passwords from a company by posing as an employee. The ease in which he charmed an employee into divulging the information underscores his belief that people are often the biggest security risks.

In another segment, Herzog interviews people who have been literally made ill by communication towers but have since found refuge in the woods near a large radio-telescope, where the towers are banned.

The film diverts its focus into robotics and the mind-boggling developments unfolding in automation, including driver-less cars; on which Tesla CEO Elon Musk offers his perspective. In a related scene, soccer-playing robots which resemble large hockey pucks demonstrate their incredible dexterity as they play a fast-moving game.

Herzog eventually arrives at space travel, where Lucianne Walkowicz; an astronomer at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, talks about the false hopes humanity places in space colonization. She talks about how mankind's poor stewardship of the environment will be recapitulated on another planet.

Herzog eventually returns to the internet, where his profound and almost rhetorical question: does the internet dream of itself?, yields fascinating answers.

I think Herzog can make any subject riveting and he does so with the internet, which I thought was a dead topic, analytically-speaking. Though critics and commentators have addressed its meaning and its negative capacities, Herzog makes the topic fresh for exploration. He asks stimulating questions and draws equally stimulating responses from his talking heads.

Herzog has a way of simultaneously evoking wonder and anxiety in his films. He considers his topic from various angles and perspectives with intellect and an artist's temperament. He also never fails to capture profoundly absurd shots, such as a group of Buddhist monks absorbed in their iPhones while the Chicago skyline towers in the background.

Though half of Herzog's film highlights technology's positive roles, I couldn't shake the more troubling aspects of what I had seen. His film left me feeling both elated and anxious, which I'm aware are emotionally contradictory states--but I felt them nevertheless.

Herzog never answers his own question about the internet but after watching his film, I feel the answer is already a foregone conclusion. If it doesn't dream of itself now, then maybe it's only a matter of time. And what then? Some of Herzog's talking heads speculate. Leave it to him to ask such a question. His excellent film shows us it is a question worth pondering. It might also leave you feeling the question might be better off left unanswered.