Heart of Glass (1976)

Description

For his next foray into the human condition, Herzog created one of the strangest and most compelling productions ever put to film, Heart Of Glass. In the late 18th century, a Bavarian village succumbs to madness as the townsfolk search for the secret to creating the unique ruby glass that is their lifeblood, lost to them when their master glassmaker dies. It's not the story that makes the film so mesmerizing, however, but the manner in which Herzog used the production as a unique experimental look into the mind. To tell his story of the town gone mad, Herzog conceived of the technique never before done on a set, at least to the degree he intended. He had the entire cast perform while hypnotized. Amazingly, the technique worked incredible effect. Every actor in the film (besides Josef Bierbichler, in the role of the prophetic seer) learned their dialogue and filmed their scenes while under hypnosis, lending the entire film a bizarre, surreal atmosphere, and giving audiences an experience unlike anything they'd ever witnessed before. The disaffected nature of the performances enhanced the story, the stilted and somnambulistic delivery of dialogue like something out of a dream. Incredibly, while Heart Of Glass is regarded as one of Herzog’s most famous works, it's also arguably one of his least seen. As Roger Ebert suggests in his four-star review of the film, the nature of the cast performances may be off-putting to many audiences. Yet for Herzog fans, including Ebert, this is one of his most intriguing works. "I think it should be approached like a piece of music," Ebert said, "in which we comprehend everything in terms of mood and aura, and know how it makes us feel even if we can't say what it makes us think."