Werner Herzog's "The Cave of Forgotten Dreams"

Has anyone else seen this movie? I wish we could have Werner Herzog as president. My affection for the man knows no bounds. In this documentary, he goes into this cave in France where the most incredibly beautiful paintings were made 32,000 years ago by these magnificent hunter-gatherers, who left us red-ochre images of their hands, paintings of bison, leopards, cave bears, rhinos, wild horses. The images are astounding. The second-best thing I've seen is Herzog's documentary about Antarctica.

What does this have to do with practice? Watching these documentaries reminds me of a time when I was fascinated with the weirdness of our existence, but didn't have any kind of elaborate explanation or philosophy about it worked out. I didn't have any precepts that I tried to live by. I didn't put massive pressure on myself to practice, practice, practice, practice. Everything was absurd and amazing. Somehow I've lost that, but Herzog still seems to have it (although I have to admit, the music in his docs can get a bit over the top)!

I saw this not long ago and was astounded. If memory serves, some of the art in this cave was created as much as five thousand years after the oldest images '“ so much we'll never know about our ancestor's world.

I don't know anything about Werner Herzog except that film and this quote: 'Evil and stupidity are the same thing. If you don't believe me, look into the eye of a chicken.'

For me the wonder has come back in spades as practice deepens...there is often no other adequate response. Sometimes I think the whole point of spiritual practice is to just surrender to the mystery of existence.

Hmm, that sounds familiar - I think I saw clips of it, I'll try to check it out.

In the mean time, this is a must see:
Werner Herzog getting shot during an interview.
"I heard it, and it hurt a little bit."

He has also made a film about a buddhist festival - Wheel of time. which is worth checking out. Also his docu film - grizzly man is an amazing watch too.

Ha! I love the chicken quote. Come to think of it, chickens are pretty scary, aren't they? This is actually why ostriches are pretty terrifying. They're like seven feet tall and have claws like a t-rex. Keep me away from those suckers...
The YouTube clip--wow! Talk about equanimity in action.
Another thing that got me in the cave movie was the postscript with the albino crocodiles. What Herzog says in the YouTube clip is that you have to open to everything. I'm guessing the openness and lack of resistance is what has helped him keep that wonder alive. I can see that I'm resisting a bunch of stuff these days. Gotta just open to it and see it for what it is. Can't wait to watch some more of his films...

I think I've seen it, it seems familiar.

I saw him present a film (at the High), can't remember, must have been Aguirre. He told a great story about dealing with notoriously difficult actor Klaus Kinski and how Kinski was too wired for the final scene and Werner basically argued him to death until Kinski was absolutely worn out, completely spent, and then they did that last scene, where Aguirre is alone on the water, his dreams shattered ... beautiful. Loved Fitzcarraldo and Burden of Dreams.