baby, it's cold inside; echoes from a (social) distance #1

I can only imagine how Werner Herzog must have felt when he realized that as he was filming “Aguirre, the Wrath of God” in the Peruvian jungle, a German 18 years old girl was fighting for survival in the same Amazonian jungle, profoundly hostile to modern man, and that includes “tree-huggers.”

That was back in 1971, a year like any other, let’s say 2009. I wouldn’t include 2020 on the same list; this must be the year of the dragon. 

I suppose it must have stroke him; Herzog is really not the type of a man that thinks of “coincidences.” On the contrary, he likes to elevate “coincidences” at the level of a miracle. 

What our civilization tediously categorize as “coincidences,” signifiers of nothingness, are actually small miracles of life; they resonate to past experiences and every now and then hint towards the future, if you ‘re willing to tune in that is. 

If you do, congratulations, you just fought back against the evil of the banality of everyday life. As evil as it gets; it buries you while still alive!

Every day is for the miracle maker. Or, the thief. 

It is March 2020 now and I would have been shamelessly self-destructive if I were to convince myself that coming across the work of Werner Herzog, right before the beginning of “the winter of our disinfectant,” could have been a mere “coincidence.” 

I knew the name, I’ve watched some films, what I didn’t know was the soul of the man, his mystic heart, his brilliant mind;  a survivalist by principle who lived in the times of the triumph of the leather sofa!

Let me be honest: I need Herzog more than we need Lars von Trier.

Not to be unfair, but the idea of walking for 23 days in order to prevent the death of a friend (a mentor!) is enormously more appealing to me than sitting idle staring melancholic at an extraterrestrial entity that is about to wipe out life on Earth.