Simon's Movie Reviews

  In the Greek myth of Sisyphus, a man is punished by being forced to roll a boulder up a hill only for the boulder to always roll back down whenever he would near the top, thus illustrating futility. In Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo (1982) the main character shows the Greeks have nothing on him as he attempts to roll not a boulder but an entire steamer up a hill. As if that wasn’t impressive enough, the hill is located in the Amazon jungle, meaning it is covered with plenty of firmly rooted trees. This movie made me think I lack ambition. This was my second viewing of a Werner Herzog movie in the past few weeks, the previous one being The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser . That one focused on one man assimilating into society after growing up in isolation, whereas Fitzcarraldo tells the incredible tale of a man who practically wages war against a jungle. You can’t say Werner Herzog is afraid to scale up, and I was certainly impressed by the effort he put into making this movie. I was al...

  Watching Charlie Chaplin’s The Gold Rush (1925) is just like watching a live-action cartoon. There is plenty of slapstick humour, an undefeatable character surviving physically impossible situations, and of course a happy ending. By today’s standards it is heavily dated in terms of technology, but it speaks volumes about Chaplin’s talent that his movie is still entertaining. I also have a feeling plenty of cartoonists were inspired by his style in the decades that followed his success. Charlie Chaplin is an icon of cinema and was at one point one of the biggest movie stars in the world. You’ll excuse if I haven’t seen all of his movies since they came out early last century, but I have made some headway in his filmography. I saw Modern Times at a university film course, and my fiancée and I recently enjoyed The Great Dictator that is now available on Netflix along with many of Chaplin’s other successes. The Gold Rush is a bit less profound in terms of content, but what it lac...

    Life is often stranger than fiction, which is why many fiction writers look to real life for their stories. German cinema icon Werner Herzog, who has made as many documentaries as fiction films, clearly has a passion for real-life stories about extraordinary characters. In The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (1974) his focus is on a man whose origins has remained an unsolved mystery since the 1800s. From an anthropological standpoint it’s a fascinating story, anchored by an actor tasked with portraying a character that is essentially a blank state. Herzog has written, directed, and starred in dozens of movies since the start of his career and sadly I have only seen a few. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans is probably his most known commercial work since it features Nicolas Cage going full Nicolas Cage. Then of course anyone with a Disney + subscription now knows Herzog as “The Client” in The Mandalorian. The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser is nowhere near as flashy as any of...