Running time: 126 minutes
Starring: Christian Bale, Jeremy Davies, Steve Zahn,
Rating 8 out of 10
German auteur Werner Herzog has a history of making films about singular, obsessive characters - such as his infamous works starring Klaus Kinski (Fitzcarraldo, Woyzeck) and last year's eye-opening documentary Grizzly Man. Now he returns to a subject close to his heart: the story of German-born US pilot Dieter Dengler who was shot down over Laos during the Vietnam War and spent a prolonged period of tortuous incarceration in the hands of his prisoners. It's the second time Herzog has made a picture about Dengler, a man who he got to know well and considered a close friend until his death in 2001. 1997's Little Dieter Needs to Fly was a documentary look at the man's extraordinary story and now Herzog returns to the same situation for a dramatic version.
And dramatic it certainly is. Herzog's films usually reach a level of heightened intensity rarely produced by other filmmakers and the opening thudding scenes of Dengler's jet decimating the South East Asian jungle call to mind Coppola's Apocalypse Now. It's not the only paean to the great Vietnam war movies of the 1970s: the prison scenes are the most hair-raising since Michael Cimino's Russian roulette moments in The Deer Hunter.
To portray the hardship and anguish that Dengler faced as well as the ingenuity and durability of the man, Herzog has found his ace card in Christian Bale, who pulls off another performance that few of his contemporaries would be capable of. Bale eats maggots and snakes, is dragged along dirt by ropes, wades through impossibly thick jungle and rivers and delivers a performance equal to any of the extremes we have seen from him before. He is ably assisted by two of Hollywood's quirkiest and idiosyncratic actors in the shape of Jeremy Davies and Steve Zahn.
Despite a slightly odd climax, this is captivating stuff. The prison scenes may not be all that easy to watch, but it all adds up to a highly memorable affair.
Paul Hurley
