“Chauvet Cave is rather like the awakening of the modern human soul or I would say the awakening of modern human culture. Because Neanderthal men who still rode the landscape parallel to the people who did these paintings didn't have culture. There's no evidence of culture, no symbolic depiction, no evidence of music, no evidence of sculptures, no evidence of religious beliefs.” PeopleMenHumansStillsSoulCultureBeliefReligiousModernPaintingEvidenceAwakeningLandscapeCavesSculptureParallelsHuman SoulSymbolicReligious BeliefDepictionNeanderthals Author:Werner Herzog
“Some of the most important caves, like Lascaux in the Dordogne region in France, have had to be closed down. There had been too many people allowed in, and they left a mold on the walls that is spreading and which can't really be stopped.” PeopleImportantLeftWallFranceRegionsCavesMold Author:Werner Herzog
“I'm one of the few reading and thinking people who loves Las Vegas for the vulgarity and omnipresence of the dream. The collective dream. There's something enormous about it. Let me say one thing: Las Vegas and cinema have similar roots. The country fair. The magician at the country fair. The vulgarity of the country fair.” PeopleThinkingCountryDreamReadingOne ThingFairsRootsLet MeEnormousCinemaCollectivesMagicianVegasLas VegasVulgarity Author:Werner Herzog
“Of course, as a German, I wouldn't like to tell the American people how to handle their criminal justice.” PeopleCoursesJusticeCriminalsHandleCriminal Justice Author:Werner Herzog
“In a way, I managed to get the deepest things, the best things out of people. That's why I'm a filmmaker. If you don't have it in you, you'd better do something else.” PeopleIfsWayBest ThingsFilmmaker Author:Werner Herzog
“Well, it had to be about the stories and the people who live under the volcano, what kind of new gods do they create? What sort of demons? And of course North Korea falls clearly into this category since the socialist revolution at the end of the Second World War. Somehow they adopted the myth of the power and dynamics of their volcano.” PeopleWorldWellsKindWarEndsStoriesFallCoursesRevolutionMythWar Of The WorldsDemonCategoriesSocialistAdoptedKoreaNorth KoreaSecond World WarDynamicsVolcanoes Author:Werner Herzog
“There are photos of Kim Jong-un right up atop the volcano. I actually wrote a letter to him asking if I could speak on camera. I never got an answer. But what was interesting was the people who were responsible for us, our "guards," it took them two days to figure out how I should address him. "President? No, you can't because there's a president for eternity." And it was a time when his status was still in flux. Only a few months later there was this party congress which assigned an official title to him, but that was after we did our film.” PeopleIfsShouldStillsTwoFilmSpeakPresidentAnswersInterestingPartyFiguresMonthsLettersEternityAskingResponsibleCamerasCongressTitlesOfficialsIf I CouldAddressesTwo DaysKimFluxVolcanoes Author:Werner Herzog
“I do not recall to [Kim Jong-un], but it was complex. "Dear young leader of the people and chairman of the joint military commission" or something like that.” PeopleYoungLeaderMilitaryComplexesDearRecallsJointsChairmanKimYoung Leaders Author:Werner Herzog
“The deal was we had to have people accompanying us and they would ask us not to film something [in North Korea]. For example, we wanted to film at a certain place and there happened to be a building under construction and it didn't look as fancy as the other buildings, so they wanted us to shoot where everything looked finished and made a good impression of the cityscape.” PeopleLooksMadeWantedFilmCertainAsksDealsHappenedExampleBuildingFinishedImpressionFancyConstructionKoreaNorth KoreaUnder ConstructionCityscapes Author:Werner Herzog
“The daredevil aspect to what I did there is moving a monstrously big ship over a mountain in the jungle of Peru with 800 or 900 or so native people from the area. So that idea was wild but the way it was executed was prudent. Nobody was ever hurt and when it became clear that we had to be more secure with the posts that would hold the ship, I spent 12 days having a post built that would have withstood the force of 10 times the weight of my ship.” PeopleWayIdeasBigsMovingForceHurtClearMountainBuiltAreasAspectWeightShipsSecurePostsNativeJunglePrudentPeruDaredevil Author:Werner Herzog
“The volcano itself wasn't that interesting, but the man who refused to be evacuated - the only one of 75,000 people - was what set the tone for the film ["Encounters at the End of the World"] that we made together [with Clive Oppenheimer] ten years later.” PeopleMenWorldYearsMadeEndsTogetherFilmInterestingHe ManTenToneEncountersEnd Of The WorldVolcanoes Author:Werner Herzog
“I think Irish people started to move to the United States - many things that were of consequence. And it was a tiny and mild event compared to what had happened 74,000 years ago.” PeopleThinkingYearsStatesMovingUnitedUnited StatesHappenedEventsConsequenceYears AgoTiny Author:Werner Herzog
“I'm very, very curious about how people live under the volcano, how they handle the permanence of danger.” PeopleDangerHandleCuriousPermanenceVolcanoes Author:Werner Herzog
“It's very strange, for example, in North Korea where the volcano at the Chinese border is some sort of the mythical birthplace of the Korean people.” PeopleExampleStrangeChineseBordersKoreaNorth KoreaKoreanVolcanoesBirthplace Author:Werner Herzog
“You have to be completely open to what people would tell you. You do not shape them; you do not force the materials into your ideas. You have to have all windows and doors open.” PeopleIdeasForceDoorsMaterialsShapesWindowWindows And Doors Author:Werner Herzog
“It seems odd, but people who see my films normally take them in in a deeper way than you would actually watch a film, let's say The Terminator or whatever.” PeopleWaySeemsFilmWatchesDeeperOdd Author:Werner Herzog
“It is something more fleeting than what you normally see. People might somehow take it into their own dreams, into their own life, in a way. I hear it more recently; people are telling me that when they leave the theater and see one of my films, they are not alone anymore. It's probably more that kind of feeling. If I managed to do a film like that, everything is fine.” PeopleIfsWayKindFeelingsDreamMightFilmFineTheaterFleetingNot Alone Author:Werner Herzog
“I must say, the people who started this whole Masterclass series have been very helpful and very intelligent to point out certain things and also give me some guidance, "isn't there something missing, shouldn't we address this or that?" so it's not completely alone out of the blue. It's very well thought through.” PeopleGivingWellsHas BeensWholeCertainMissingGive MeIntelligentBlueSeriesGuidanceAddressesHelpful Author:Werner Herzog
“I have worked for YouTube like texting and driving because I was curious to test what's out there and how does it function, can I release something like about texting and driving to very young audiences, at the age where they do their drivers test? And the response was phenomenal, millions of people saw it.” PeopleDoeAgeYoungMillionsAudienceSawsTestsFunctionResponseDrivingCuriousReleaseDriversYoutubePhenomenalTextingTexting And Driving Author:Werner Herzog
“Do you not then hear this horrible scream all around you that people usually call silence.” PeopleSilenceHorribleScream Author:Werner Herzog
“Meanwhile it's got stormy, the tattered fog even thicker, chasing across my path. Three people are sitting in a glassy tourist cafe between clouds and clouds, protected by glass from all sides. Since I don't see any waiters, it crosses my mind that corpses have been sitting there for weeks, statuesque. All this time the cafe has been unattended, for sure. Just how long have they been sitting here, petrified like this?” PeopleMindLongHas BeensThreeSidesPathWeekSittingCrossesCloudsGlassesProtectedFogChasingCorpsesTouristsWaiterStormyCafes Author:Werner Herzog
“People think we had a love-hate relationship. Well, I did not love him, nor did I hate him. We had mutual respect for each other, even as we both planned each other's murder.” PeopleThinkingWellsHateRespectI HateMurderMutualLove HateMutual RespectHate HimLove Hate RelationshipLove And Hate RelationshipI Hate Him Author:Werner Herzog
“You must live life in its very elementary forms. The Mexicans have a very nice word for it: pura vida. It doesn't mean just purity of life, but the raw, stark-naked quality of life. And that's what makes young people more into a filmmaker than academia.” PeopleLifeMeanFormYoungQualityNiceNakedLive LifeFilmmakerPurityVidaQuality Of LifeVery NiceStarksAcademiaNice Words Author:Werner Herzog
“I do other sorts of things. I act in other people's movies. I direct operas. I write books.” PeopleWritingBookDirectOpera Author:Werner Herzog
