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.

The Look of Silence

Director: Joshua Oppenheimer

Director Joshua Oppenheimer's follows-up his masterful documentary The Act of Killing (2012) with The Look of Silence, which continues his examination of Indonesia's violent past; specifically the brutal, mass killings of communists in 1965. The film perfectly illustrates the oft quoted words by William Faulkner "The past is never dead. It's not even past." The murder of one million communists by the Indonesian military, who wrested power from the government, has hardly been forgotten by those who were victimized directly or indirectly. We know from Oppenheimer's previous film that those responsible have hardly expressed any guilt or remorse for their crimes and in fact, often recall their acts of brutality with a degree of glee; as if the deaths were amusing anecdotes. It is appalling to learn that many of those responsible still occupy positions of power in the government and will never be punished or held accountable for their evil.

In the surreal The Act of Killing, perpetrators were asked to recreate their crimes on film in a movie genre of their choosing. The Look of Silence employs a more conventional documentarian's approach; victims and perpetrators alike are interviewed about the brutal purge of 1965. Serving as the film's conscience is Adi Rukun, whose parents managed to survive the wave of violence though his older brother was tortured and eventually murdered by the death squads.

We learn the death squads were made up of ordinary citizens enlisted by the military to carry out their dirty work; savagery executed in earnest and without compunction. Adi, with Oppenheimer at his side, conducts interviews with the perpetrators and the victims. What interviewees share is always fascinating. Adding an odd texture to the proceedings is Adi's optometry work, which provides a kind of distraction for the interviewees and a means for Oppenheimer to tease confessional responses from his interviewees. The very first shot in the film of an optometrist's ocular device resting on a subject's face gives us a taste of the visual eccentricity we saw in The Act of Killing. We also see Adi interact with his elderly and infirm parents; his emaciated, blind and nearly deaf father and his frail, white-haired mother.

It is astonishing to find the squad members are so forthcoming about their past and their willingness to share the most gruesome details of the killings and torture. Adi finds the two men who murdered Adi's brother, who unashamedly recount, in gory detail, how they carried out the killng and how they disposed of his body. Throughout the film, Adi is able to listen to tales of butchery and sadism with superhuman equanimity, which is a story in itself.

As one might expect, the guilty are unapologetic and if sorrow is ever expressed, it is solely articulated by their offspring. In one scene, Adi and a death squad member's daughter bond and embrace--one of the few gestures of reconciliation we see in the film.
So much about the film is powerful. I found Adi's optometry tests to be a perfect metaphor for magnifying the past with clear objectivity. The metaphor is almost too perfect. In the back of my mind was the age-old question about how neighbors and countrymen are able to visit the worst brutalities on one another in times of social upheaval. Another pertinent question might be how former victims and death squad members are able to live together in the same neighborhood without mutual hostility. It is quite disturbing to hear one death squad member talk about how it could all happen again; a frightening prospect looming in Indonesia's future.

Oppenheimer's film offers no closure nor does it offer any hope of justice. Justice would be impossible to obtain anyway when the perpetrators are the majority and the incumbent power.

It makes sense that master documentarians Werner Herzog and Errol Morris would serve as executive directors on Oppenheimer's film. Both directors are well-acquainted with Oppenheimer's techniques and are no strangers to tackling tough, controversial subjects.

Though the film is powerful and unwavering in its pursuit of truth, I didn't find it to be as absorbing as Oppenheimer's previous film. The Act of Killing told me everything I needed to know about the purge and Indonesia's strange relationship to its past. Oppenheimer's film certainly deserves its Oscar nomination; it is fearless and honest but something of a repeat. Nevertheless, it deserves the recognition the nomination brings. If accountability and justice are impossibilities, at least Oppenheimer's film doesn't let the past escape scrutiny.

Life Itself

Director: Steve James With appearances by Martin Scorsese, Werner Herzog, Errol Morris, Chaz Ebert, Richard Corliss, A.O. Scott et. al.

It is astonishing to think that a film critic from the Chicago Sun-Times achieved international fame for simply offering his two-cents on films. Roger Ebert was well known to cinephiles and non-cinephiles alike and his appearance on television and in printed media always seemed like a given. A documentary about Ebert seems redundant when one considers the ubiquity of his prescence. But Steve James, the talented documentary filmmaker behind Hoop Dreams, Reel Dreams and Stevie, now offers us a moving, extraordinary biopic on a man I thought I knew.

We first see Ebert in the hospital in what was the last year of his life. His jaw is incurably slack, leaving him with his mouth continuously open; his non-existent lower palate a grim reminder of his thyroid cancer, which made intraveneous feedings necessary and left him barely able to walk. It is Ebert's insistence that he be filmed in this state though it is often difficult to watch.

James' film alternately visits Ebert's past and present and in doing so leaves us with a startling contrast. Much of the film's narration is taken from Ebert's memoir Life Itself and what I thought was a recording of Ebert is actually actor Stephen Stanton, whose voice is almost indistinguishable from Ebert himself.

We see Ebert in old photographs from his childhood in Urbana, Illinois and hear from friends and colleagues how eager he was to have a by-line. His parents encouraged his writing, which eventually earned him the editor's role in his college newspaper. Ebert's friends remember his time as editor as being exceptional for his coverage of salient events of the day, including the violence surrounding the civil-rights struggles in the south.

The film moves on to Ebert's job at the Chicago Sun-Times; where he was offered his coveted by-line as the film critic; a position he would hold for decades. Even the prestige of the Pulitzer prize and lucrative job offers from the New York Times and the Boston Globe couldn't lure Ebert from his position at the Chicago Sun-Times.

From here we enter a darker period of his life, focusing on Ebert's alcoholism, which he remembers as a very real agent in his near-destruction. From the narration, we learn that if not for his terrible hang-overs, he may not have overcome his illness in the late 70s'. By then he was already well on his way to achieving celebrity status with his famous counterpart Gene Siskel on the syndicated movie-review show, which underwent numerous name-changes over the years.

A more humorous, obscure episode in his life was his work as screenwriter for Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, a film for which Martin Scorsese offers a tentative endorsement. It is also touching to hear Scorsese talk about Ebert's review of his first feature film, which brought the filmmaker attention, if not acclaim. Later we listen to Scorsese discuss a bleak low-point in his life and career in the late 70s' and how a tribute to his work by Siskel and Ebert at the Toronto Film Festival helped extricate the director from a morose phase. To hear Scorsese tearfully recount the experience, we are moved by his gratitude to the two critics. Scorsese's involvement in the film as Executive Producer might reflect this. It is also interesting to hear Scorsese recall Ebert's pan of The Color of Money; an act for which the director holds no grudge. The account underscores how critics and filmmakers share an uneasy and sometimes adversarial relationship.

We also learn about the behind-the-scenes evolution of Siskel and Ebert's show, whose audience continued to swell in the 1980s' and 1990s'. What began as mutual contempt between the critics, morphed into a close, fraternal relationship. It is astonishing to hear how Ebert felt he was closer to Siskel than any other man in his entire life.

One of the key moments in Ebert's life was his marriage to Chaz Ebert, who contributes her own personal accounts throughout the film. Ebert cites his deep, fulfilling relationship with Chaz as a life-impacting experience. We see her as she lovingly attends to his needs, which were many in his physically diminished state.

Many filmmakers weigh in on what Ebert meant to their careers. Errol Morris discusses Ebert's review of his film Gates of Heaven, which helped bring critical acclaim while Werner Herzog speaks fondly of seeing Ebert's star on his strolls on the walk of fame. Critics also have their say; most notably Richard Corliss, who feuded with Ebert over the supposed dumbing down of film criticism, specifically leveled against the syndicated program.

What it all amounts to is a fascinating, touching portrait of a man who achieved fame for something that doesn't normally bestow fame on practitioners. No film critic since has touched such stratospheric heights and most likely ever will again.

James' film is absorbing, sometimes heartbreaking and often unflinching. Whatever one believes about Ebert as a person or critic, one indisputable truth is his love for cinema. The fact that he spent part of the last year of his life watching films attests to the validity of the statement. For someone who grew up reading and listening to Ebert's reviews, I can honestly say everyone who writes about film, including myself, owes him some kind of debt.
It is interesting to see the camera turned on a critic. We are watching a film about a guy who watched films. It is an interesting paradox and for Life Itself, it makes perfect sense.