Werner Herzog

I’m celebrating Werner Herzog’s 71st birthday here at Agitation Towers with a large glass of wine and my well-thumbed copy of ‘Herzog on Herzog’. Some favourite quotes:

“I remember having a public discussion with the diminutive Agnes Varda, who seemed to take offence at my postulation that a filmmaker, rather than having this or that quality, should be able to clear his or her own height. She didn’t like that very much.”

“Someone like Jean-Luc Godard is for me intellectual counterfeit money when compared with a good kung-fu film.”

“I never had a choice about becoming a director. This became clear to me within a few dramatic weeks at the age of fourteen when I began to travel on foot and converted to the Catholic faith. After a long series of failures it was only a short step into filmmaking, even though to this day I have problems seeing it as a real profession.”

“Maybe the most important piece of advice I can give those of you heading into the world of film is that as long as you are able-bodied, as long as you can make money yourself, do not go looking for office jobs to pay the rent … Go out to where the real world is, go work as a bouncer in a sex club, a warden in a lunatic asylum or in a slaughterhouse. Walk on foot, learn languages, learn a craft or trade that has nothing to do with cinema. Filmmaking must have experience of life at its foundation.”