''La Soufrière – Warten auf eine unausweichliche Katastrophe'' ("La Soufrière – Waiting for an Inevitable Disaster") is a 1977

documentary film A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...

in which

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

director

Werner Herzog Werner Herzog (; né Stipetić; born 5 September 1942) is a German filmmaker, actor, opera director, and author. Regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema, his films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with unusu ...

visits an evacuated town on the island of

Guadeloupe Guadeloupe is an Overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department and region of France in the Caribbean. It consists of six inhabited islands—Basse-Terre Island, Basse-Terre, Grande-Terre, Guadeloupe, Grande-Terre, Marie-Galant ...

, where the volcano

La Grande Soufrière La Grande Soufrière (; ), or simply Soufrière (), is an active stratovolcano on the French island of Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe. It is the highest mountain peak in the Lesser Antilles, rising high. The last magmatic eruption was in 1530±30 du ...

is predicted to erupt.

Background

The pretext of this film was provided when Herzog "heard about the impending volcanic eruption, that the island of

had been evacuated and that one peasant had refused to leave, eknew ewanted to go talk to him and find out what kind of relationship towards death he had" (Cronin). Herzog explores the deserted streets of the towns on the island. The crew of three treks up to the

caldera A caldera ( ) is a large cauldron-like hollow that forms shortly after the emptying of a magma chamber in a volcanic eruption. An eruption that ejects large volumes of magma over a short period of time can cause significant detriment to the str ...

, where clouds of

sulfur Sulfur ( American spelling and the preferred IUPAC name) or sulphur ( Commonwealth spelling) is a chemical element; it has symbol S and atomic number 16. It is abundant, multivalent and nonmetallic. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms ...

ous steam and smoke drift like "harbingers of death" (Peucker), an example of the sublime Herzog seeks to conjure in his films. Herzog converses in French with three different men he finds remaining on the island: one says he is waiting for death, and even demonstrates his posture for doing so; another says he has stayed to look after the animals. In the end, the volcano did not erupt, thus sparing the lives of those who had remained on the island, including Herzog and his crew.

References

* Paul Cronin, ''Herzog on Herzog'' (London: Faber and Faber Ltd., 2002, ) p. 148. *

Brigitte Peucker Brigitte Peucker (born 13 April 1948, in Berlin, Germany) is the Elias Leavenworth Professor of German Languages and Literatures and Professor of Film Studies at Yale University. A disciple of Yale University's Geoffrey Hartman, she has written on ...

, "In Quest of the Sublime," ''New German Filmmakers: From

Oberhausen Oberhausen (, ) is a city on the river Emscher in the Ruhr Area, Germany, located between Duisburg and Essen ( ). The city hosts the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen and its Gasometer Oberhausen is an anchor point of the European Rout ...

Through the 1970s'', edited by Klaus Phillips (New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., 1984, hardcover: and paperback: ) p. 168.

External links

*
''La Soufriere''
at

Allmovie AllMovie (previously All Movie Guide) is an online database with information about films, television programs, television series, and screen actors. , AllMovie.com and the AllMovie consumer brand are owned by RhythmOne. History AllMovie was ...

Werner Herzog on filming ''La Soufrière''
(Video interview from '' Capturing Reality: The Art of Documentary'') 1977 films 1977 short documentary films German short documentary films West German films Documentary films about disasters Films directed by Werner Herzog Films set in Guadeloupe Films shot in Guadeloupe Documentary films about volcanoes 1970s German films {{hist-documentary-film-stub

Background

See also

Related Werner Herzog films

References

External links