Herzog sings Antarctica's praises

The famously eccentric director films in a live volcano on his new project.

Dec 18 2006

The stereotypical image of Antarctica is of an uninhabitable place where only the bravest of men dare to venture. But while the chilly continent might have been thus in the time of explorers like Roald Amundsen, Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton, it has changed drastically over the years. German director Werner Herzog, who has just finished filming at a live volcano located in Mount Erebus in the Antarctic Spring, says the area is no longer as alienating as everyone thinks.

'It's a perpetuated sort of image since the days of 1903 or 1910 or 1911, when Scott and Amundsen and Shackleton were out here,' the 64-year-old filmmaker told Reuters in a recent interview. 'Now you have got a cafeteria, you have got the barber shop and the TV station. You've got the ATM machine, so what else can you ask for?'

The list of comforts that Herzog ticked off were readily available at McMurdo Station, the biggest US science installation on the continent and the base for his documentary, to air on the Discovery Channel next year.

'Good transportation, a warm bed, a shower,' Herzog continued. 'It is easy and nobody should try to perpetuate the aspect that this is a wild, furiously anti-human sort of continent.'

The director became interested in Antarctica after watching underwater footage of McMurdo captured by diver and experimental guitarist Henry Kaiser. But Herzog was hesitant when Kaiser encouraged him to make a film there.

'Somehow, casually, he asked me, 'wouldn’t you like to go to Antarctica?' And I said yes, but I'm not useful here: I'm not a pilot, I'm not a scientist, I'm not a cook, I'm not a mechanic,' Herzog said. 'I'm not needed, not wanted and kind of useless.'

The 'Grizzly Man' helmer ended up giving in to temptation and travelling to Antarctica as part of the National Science Foundation's programme for artists.

But instead of focusing on the Antarctic's weather, which to Herzog 'looked like stupid postcards,' the director turned his attention to the people working in Antarctica today.

'My feeling is very much about the people who end up here, who do science, who service the community, who do logistics, who do the dishwashing,' he said. 'You do not find good men and good women like that easily anywhere.'

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