Lessons of Darkness (1992 TV Movie) User Reviews

Must be seen to be believed

[dcavallo · 9/10 · 30 April 2002]

Herzog has been making brilliant films since the late '60s, and frankly it's a bit of a pain in the arse keeping up with such a prolific director.

However, if you are a fan of his features and staggering documentary work, "Lessons of/in Darkness" demands your immediate attention.

The film is essentially a birds-eye view (often quite literally) of the plague of oil-choked death, fire, chaos and destruction that resulted from the brief but grotesquely internecine technological blitzkrieg of the Gulf War. Herzog, of course, takes particular interest in the seeming madness of the crews of mercernary American firefighters that are putting out the oil well fires across the deserts.

Various points on the conflict and its aftermath inevitably bubble to the surface, but arise without overt proselytizing. The images do the majority of the talking.

And they are eye-popping. Startling, frightening visuals that stand out even in the Herzog canon -- great vistas of blackness and glowing terror that would make any sci-fi director soylent green with envy. They are accompanied by little else: brief interstitials, an almost nonexistent, terribly serious Herzog narrative and a ghostly and elegiac score.

The short interviews with individuals who suffered are heartbreaking, perhaps all the more so due to their brevity.

See this.

Herzog's apocalyptic vision of Kuwait is grand and memorable

[FilmFlaneur · 9/10 · 15 September 2000]

Herzog's grandiose manner, sense of the operatic, and true historical events come together awe-inspiringly in this apocalyptic vision of oil fires and destruction left in the wake of the Gulf War.

If ever a man was fitted to undertake the portrayal of destruction on such a grand scale, then Herzog is he. It would be interesting to know whether this documentary was a commission or Hertzog directed this film on a personal, artistic basis. Whatever the reason for its production, Lessons of Darkness (it's English title) is a stunning piece of work. The Kuwaiti landscape is presented in sweeping, wide angle shots making it look like the surface of an alien planet rather than the Middle East. Huge oil fires, the cratered burnt desert, dark oil spills, crumpled and abandoned machinery and war vehicles, appear in surreal and awesome parade which both take the viewer's breath away in their beauty and shock through the utter devastation.

A central section, in which quiet footsteps walk alongside a ghastly display of torture implements, provides a shocking contrast to the images that open the film. Here the impact is smaller, more intimate but as moving.

In the third and last part of the film, firefighters attempt to douse the oil blazes, their hoses and equipment rearing up and out in the smoke and sunshine, shining like monsters in the alien landscape.

The sonorous music of Wagner perfectly complements a vision which is an entirely characteristic, memorable addition to Herzog's oeuvre.

not quite science fiction, not quite documentary- science-reality?

[Quinoa1984 · 9/10 · 26 January 2007]

While Werner Herzog has stated that he looks at his 1992 film Lessons of Darkness as a work of science fiction, it shouldn't be discounted as a documentary either. But unlike the recent Wild Blue Yonder, where Herzog made a true science fiction documentary, this time the line is further blurred by making everything involving humans ambiguous as to their connections with their surroundings. Despite the locations being discernible as to where it's at, and the two interviews being indicative of where the people are possibly from, he keeps his 54 minute plunge into the Kuwait oil fields a primarily visual trip. It sometimes even felt like someone had decided to do a documentary on some civilization in the future in some obscure sci-fi novel (or, for a moment, like some wayward planet in the Dune universe). It's best then, as Herzog suggests, to take one out of context of the period, even if seeing the green-screen images (however brief) of the war conjures up immediate associations. If looking at this without the associations of the Iraq war part 1 or the Kuwait connection in it all with oil however (as with Wild Blue Yonder not associating that its 'just' NASA and underwater photography), it fills one with an immense wonder at what can be captured by a lens not bound by conventions.

But amid the freedom that Herzog decides to use with his resources, he ends up striking his most visually compelling treatise on destruction to date. It's like he decided to take certain cues from Kubrick via 2001, and from just general nature documentaries, in order to capture the sort of alien aspect to this all. Because the act of setting these oil fields, which were left in a state of disrepair following said "fictional" war, is like facing nature off on a course against nature (fire on oil, then water on fire). There's also the element of industry that finds this way in this mix, especially because of the presence of human beings in this mix. Herzog, in avant-garde fashion (ala Dieter and Yonder) sections off the scenes with Roman numerals, and in theme and tone it does work (e.g. a part meant for showing the machines trudging around is labeled as being part of 'dinosaurs', or when the people set the oil on fire and the others are "mad" in coming in on it). And eventually what starts out as just simple, yet spatially complex, aerial takes on the tattered fields, turns into an act of seeing ruin and something that would seem incredible in an objective frame of reference.

But that doesn't mean Herzog limits it completely to total dialog-less landscapes (which, as Herzog has said in the past, he likes to think in grandiose terms he "directs") of fire and obtuse figures fanning and producing the flames. He also gets two interviews with women who were around when the war was there- one who is given no words for what she says except that her husband was killed, another who had a child with her and who is now traumatized- and somehow this too works even out of context. I'm sure that if Herzog had wanted to, even in limited time and circumstances he was in, he could be able to work some political stance in the proceedings. His decision to keep politics or anything of the immediate recognizable in concrete terms is a wise one. Not that there isn't something concrete to seeing destruction of this magnitude. But there's an abstract quality to all of this after a while that makes it all the more real in nature, while still keeping to a control of the subject matter into something that looks out of this world, ethereal, and somehow unnatural while still being about nature all the same (hence science-reality).

It's almost too arty for its own good in a small way, with Herzog's inter-titles and ultra-somber voice-over becoming like gravestones marking the sections of one set of madness to another. But there's also a daring here that is totally unshakable too, and from a point of view of cinematography it actually goes on par (if not occasionally seems to top) what Kubrick did in 2001 or what Lynch could've done in Dune, which is that a filmmaker uses places and objects that are of this world, but then taking the audience to a place that is also assuredly not so. It adds a level of mental discomfort, but then that's likely a big part of the point- seeing the oil burned by order of a government that's been on the news we watch every night is one thing (or rather was), but it's another to suddenly take it in another light, where in the realm of science-fiction it asks the viewer to raise questions via abstractions one might forget when taking it as complete truth. It's a hybrid film that you'd never see this in a cineplex next to the big-bang sci-fi action fare, but then most probably wouldn't want to.

Never call Herzog a dilettante

[futures-1 · 28 October 2006]

Never call Werner Herzog a dilettante. When he sets out to make a film, he's willing to die for it. Although this film could have easily been adjusted to a pure documentary of the oil fires in Kuwait after the Iraq invasion, Herzog takes it to much higher levels. War. Apocalypse. Mythical Disaster. The End of Life as we knew it. THE Struggle (and, since this is made by a dark-visioned German, we do NOT win the struggle. At best, we earn a temporary truce with the Devil.) This is perhaps the MOST BEAUTIFULLY PHOTOGRAPHED COLOR film I've EVER seen. Bar none. The scoring, as usual, is unique and perfect. "Lessons of Darkness" is atypically vague for a film in my category "Life Changers", yet I am left extremely moved by the powerful effects of an exquisite visual and audio work of Art.

Like a nightmare realized

[sgtslut · 10/10 · 2 March 2000]

Lessons of darkness is one of the most captivating, hypnotic experiences I have ever witnessed. I felt like I was in a strange nightmare and in an alien world. The film is almost purely visual; it is breathtakingly shot. It feels more like science fiction than most sci-fi films ever made. Absolutely haunting.

Mission Accomplished

[nienhuis · 10/10 · 30 December 2005]

Lessons of Darkness (1992) looks and acts like a companion piece to Fata Morgana (1971). As with the earlier film, Lessons either captures viewers or leaves them confused and bored within the first few minutes. Early in Lessons we see an aerial shot of an unusual city. It is obviously a contemporary urban area because we see highways, traffic, stoplights, and large buildings, but it is also obvious that it is not an American city. The narrator (Herzog) announces that this city is about to be destroyed by war and the thought of this strange but vibrant place being destroyed becomes completely repugnant. Thus, Herzog succeeds here with the approach he initially planned and then abandoned in Fata Morgana. Lessons of Darkness triumphs as a mock Science Fiction story of an apocalypse that threatens all of civilization. Luckily, it doesn't take a college education to realize that the footage is shot in Iraq in the aftermath of the First Gulf War. Luckily as well, Herzog's anti-war statement does not need to be explicit to be effective. Early in the film, interviews with two Iraqi women suggest the human price of this military event. In the rest of the film, humans appear to be on the periphery of the "action" but they keep coming back to the center of our consciousness. Those who persist in their viewing will eventually encounter a chilling repetitiveness in this film (the fires are still burning!) However, that repetitiveness can become cumulative and mesmerizing. This is not a film experience for everyone, but for those who have a taste for it the film will be unforgettable.

Powerful images

[RovingGambler · 8/10 · 24 November 2007]

Werner Herzog narrates sparingly from an alien's perspective, but for the most part lets the images do the talking themselves. And yes, there are some pretty powerful images contained within this 50 minute documentary.

This is a pretty typical Herzog documentary, which if you aren't familiar with him, that means it's a pretty slow paced film. But the images are so great, if you let yourself get caught up in them, I don't see the slow pacing to be a problem. Herzog always says he's looking for "ecstatic truth" in his films. I think he achieved that with this one.

A pure masterpiece, unsurpassed in its visual power...

[rasler · 10/10 · 8 April 2007]

This is less a documentary than it is a work of art. Herzog presents a visual symphony comparable to the grandeur of Dante.

The cinematography of this movie is a constant presence of beauty and terror, heart-throbbing and breathtaking, still always far from pathos. Inspiring and touching throughout its full length, Herzog demonstrates the power of pictures, the essence of film or photography as a medium separate from logical understanding.

There is no storyline to this motion picture since it defines itself as such, - not as a visual derogative of verbal expression but as a free form of expression displayed in sensuous, demanding and touching PICTURES!

This movie is a must for any photographer or person involved in visual arts, I have seldom encountered such a sincere and demanding work of cinematography.

In a frenzy of subjectivity this flick deserves a full 10 out of 10, I am ready to die now, thank you...

A Stark and disquieting look at the cost of human conflict

[williampsamuel · 7/10 · 12 December 2014]

Werner Hertzog's Lessons of Darkness is not your usual documentary. There's little narration, only two brief interviews, and no Nova style recreations. It's among the least informative docs I've seen, but it's not trying to educate. It exists merely as a visual record of the destruction wrought on Kuwait by Saddam's armies, and a reminder of the evils of which man is capable. On that level, it succeeds. The footage speaks for itself; you don't need anyone to tell you that you're looking at hell on earth.

Plus, Lessons of Darkness isn't a strait documentary in the purest sense. It's also intended as a silent parable of an apocalypse brought on by man's madness. When we see only endless desolation, fires and seas of oil stretching beyond the horizon, it's not hard to imagine that the entire world has been consumed. Some have considered this film to be anti-war. I suppose it is to a degree, although not overtly so. It doesn't deliver political commentary, or preach about the need for peace at any price but it does offer a stark reminder of the price of human conflict.

And what a price there was. Cities looted, people raped and murdered, burning wells and lakes of oil as far as the eye can see. Looking at the destruction, I'm overcome with the pointlessness of it all. I can understand why the Iraqi troops stole everything up to the marble on the buildings, but what does it gain them to light up every well, bomb every storage tank, and douse a national park with millions of gallons of crude? What bitterness and depravity drives men to set a country ablaze?

Even worse is what they did to the people. A mother tells how soldiers broke into her house at night, trampled her son almost to death, and shot her husband, enjoying themselves the whole time. There was no reason for this; it wasn't even done as part of a reprisal. How sick must a man be to derive pleasure from hurting an innocent child? Standing as a counterpoint to outright psychopathy of the invaders is the bravery and dedication of the firefighters putting out the blaze. There are no interviews with them, and no explanation of their craft, but simply seeing them drive a bulldozer or excavator up to mouth of hell, or physically manhandling a pipe junction onto a geyser of oil tells you that they must be incredibly courageous and a bit nuts. I personally cannot imagine what it must be like to work in such overpowering heat, clothes reeking of oil, with the knowledge that a single spark could blow you into kingdom come.

The movie's overall effect is sobering and haunting, with eeriness added by the sound track. I'm not sure why Hertzog chose most of the classical pieces he did. Some are dirge-like and sad, but most seem more fitting for footage of the moon, or a volcano. The odd pairing of music and visuals did not detract from my enjoyment of the film, but others might be somewhat weirded out. I am also at a loss to explain the scene in which workers cast flaming rags into jets of oil, reigniting them. The director, in keeping with his vision of apocalypse, suggests that the men a seized with insanity, and have become so used to the fires that they cannot live in a world without them. This is of course not the case, but for the life of me I cannot fathom what end it served.

All in all, this is not the film to see if want to learn more about the Gulf War and the rebuilding effort. However, if you are seeking a quiet reflection on the evil and madness that men are capable of, and a vision of what hell must surely resemble, this will do.

Apocalypse Right Now (Spoiler: War is Gruesome)

[batzi8m1 · 10/10 · 3 November 1999]

This ranks as one of the few documentaries, along with Littlest Soldier, where his politics and German Guilt are most direct. Usually he limits himself to studies of character, individuals. This one is about the character of modern warfare and brings up memories of The Doors' When the Music's Over, and reference to Apocalypse Now. Herzog flies in a helicopter, through oil fires, playing Wagner, and reading from the Apocalypse. This is a filmaker's documentary of life imitating art imitating life. Even if you don't think real images of scenes usually reserved for horror movies are moving, the photography of the colors of the sun through the smoke and fire is stunning. And those who think it's politics are one sided should note the equally graphic details of the results of both sides' work. For those that don't remember, there was a little action in the Persian Gulf in 1991.

Beautiful and eerie, more sci-fi than documentary

[tomgillespie2002 · 7/10 · 12 August 2011]

Werner Herzog does not make documentaries. He manipulates the truth in order create an artistic truth that channels reality in the way he feels it should be seen. The approach he takes with Lessons Of Darkness is a similar style to the quite brilliant Fata Morgana and the hypnotic, yet slight meandering, The Wild Blue Yonder. He does a similar thing yet not quite to the same style in the brilliant Grizzly Man and the solid Little Dieter Learns To Fly. He has been often criticised for this, yet I feel it is what makes him one of the greatest and most interesting film-makers in history, and one of the best documentary film-makers of recent times.

His focus in Lessons Of Darkness is the desolate and ruined landscape of post-Gulf War Kuwait. His camera sweeps along the country with an fascination and curiosity from the viewpoint of a complete outsider. Herzog has stated that he regularly shoots his documentaries as if he were a visiting alien on his first day on Earth. The film is separated by thirteen different chapters, focusing their attention on burned-out military vehicles, weapons of torture, and most beautifully, the burning oil fields of Kuwait and the men given the task of putting out these massive fireballs.

About two-thirds of the film are dedicated to the oil fields, and they are a wonder to behold. Herzog's camera and almost philosophical narration given with that strange German accent portray it as almost a biblical disaster. The whole sky is literally scarred with black smoke, and the flames burn brightly for miles on end. As usual, Herzog becomes fascinated with the workers who are putting the flames out, always being transfixed by people put through extreme experiences. He shows them as they re-ignite the fires when they were just a jet of oil spurting into the air, and wonders if they have becomes engulfed by madness and a need to stay out of the darkness.

No-one makes documentaries quite as hypnotic and enticing as Herzog, and this is no exception. While not reaching the brilliance of Fata Morgana, Grizzly Man or Encounters At The End Of The World, the film is still a fascinating portrait of a slightly neglected topic. He stays out of political viewpoints and only includes a couple of interviews, instead remaining as a mere observer. A fine example of why Herzog is one of the most prolific and original directors in cinema history, and possibly my all-time favourite director.

www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com

of another world

[hhargreaves · 9/10 · 11 September 2000]

There is a sense with this documentary, that the middle east is part of another world altogether. It opens with a fly over of Kuwait pre-war, looking like a place far removed from this world, with its quasi-religious skyscrapers welcoming the camera as it comes over the port. Satellites are shown post-war, blown apart in a tangled mass resembling a fallen space station. Echoing a sci-fi, but with a ghostlike feeling only reality can achieve. The images are reinforced by some of the most moving music ever composed. Herzog struggles with a large lump in his throat, to clarify the situation with infrequent narration. The situation speaks for itself, no words are necessary, the images and the music combine to get as close to representing the unrepresentable as possible. I recommend Godfrey Reggio's Koyaanisqatsi (1983) to fellow admires of this film, and it's message.

Fires of Kuwait is better

[iain-72694 · 6/10 · 15 March 2017]

I watched Lessons of Darkness after seeing a GIF on Reddit of a fireman igniting an oil well by throwing a torch.

https://i.imgur.com/j6FLnTP.gifv

Herzog made an artistic film with an operatic, apocalyptic score over helicopter footage of Mordor-like desolation. It's awe inspiring and beautiful, but it's also a grim and angry work.

I preferred "Fires of Kuwait". It's more informative, has better photography and, most importantly it's hopeful.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104275/

atmospheric magic

[kalle-11 · 26 June 2000]

I was lucky enough to catch a one-off showing of this at the Brooklyn Academy of Music and it completely floored me. Although not for everyone (as with all Herzog films), he gives us a present day apocalyptic vision, infused with biblical and mythical power that ranks as highly as any of his feature film efforts. Herzog's lush visuals reach a new peak (in particular the aerial footage), as they are accompanied by incredibly fitting music and narration. This film is as close as cinema comes to painting. If you get a chance to see this, then do not hesitate. Prepare yourself for a rush.

Oil!

[Polaris_DiB · 10/10 · 9 December 2009]

Werner Herzog documents the Kuwaiti oil fires during the Gulf War. That is the simple explanation not given during the film or the movie's narration, and does not inform the composition of the work. Rather, here is an apocalyptic tale of a city divided, destroyed, and replaced by raging infernos, man-made volcanoes, plains turned to deserts and forests subsumed by lakes of oil. The movie itself is very elemental and often contrasts opposing forces, water and fire, oil and sky. Herzog adds classical music for poetic effect, and shows characters, all of whom have lost their voices.

The first half is Apocalypse realized, complete with Biblical notation and everything. The landscape is destroyed, long helicopter shots show nothing but wasteland. The second half is more curious, and ultimately more disturbing. For the majority of the second half you watch as people put out the fires, dig through the oil, and rebuild, reintroducing technology and solidity and community to the landscape. Then, less you read a hopeful message into this feature, those same workers reignite the fire. No real motivation is explained or described, except that the workers themselves subsist off of continuing the destruction.

Herzog has always shown a propensity to bringing the camera to the edges of survival and human condition, and even the technical aspects of bringing a film camera so close to raging infernos and spraying oil wells has to be taken into account. He is fearless for his craft, his equipment, and his life, and it is because he imbues all of his cinema completely with his soul.

--PolarisDiB

Wow, baby such lovely and disastrous pictures - unforgettable

[larskjelras · 10/10 · 11 October 2000]

Herzog is such a darling bringing all his weirdness and filmmaking skills into a special little masterpiece like this one. Small details like a little flame in the middle of gigantic cloud of black smoke or making a bulldozer beautiful is captured and it is wonderful.

Only the dead have seen the end of war!

[CathodeRayTerrors · 10/10 · 18 September 2022]

When viewing Heir Herzog's fantastically haunting documentary that famous Plato quote comes to mind.

Lessons In Darkness is truly something else. The visuals are so arresting they're almost fictionally abstract. So tragic how we continue to destroy ourselves and our planet. The Cathars believed that hell was earth. Watching Lessons in Darkness makes an excellent case in that direction.

Cinematography is what you'd come to expect from a Werner Herzog film; striking. And it has to be because the narration is minimalist. Just there to accent the visuals, not to add to them. While it was filmed before and after the siege on Kuwait this point is not made. It could be anywhere and that's the whole point; our planet is dear to us and this shouldn't happen anywhere.

A must watch for anyone of any age but essentially our youth for they are our future policy makers and keepers of our planet.

Apologies to future children of flame wars

[ThurstonHunger · 8/10 · 6 August 2016]

Well, if like me, you'd find a McDonald's commercial narrated by Werner Herzog somewhat fascinating, then you might as well see this.

I should have a long time ago, the film is nearly 25 years old...

To me it is almost like a found footage film, with the narration on top taking some otherwordly images and pushing them a bit further out of the grasp of the gravity of our mundane existence. I expect for some moments in your past you've felt like "A Man Who Fell to Earth" before or at least been a "Brother From Another Planet" I feel like Herzog turns that trick here on his viewers.

Even looking at daily life with an overdose of introspection, some of what we see every day can become strange and alien. Moreso for the rare view of what happened in Kuwait after more of mankind's failures aka war.

So the story and titled chapters not quite fitting with the images, but offering something quasi-plausible allowed at least my mind to wander into these semi sci-fi scenes. But it is a trap....as amidst the make-believe movie we do then meet some undeniably real people, still reeling from the war.

We may want to dismiss this all as foreign and as remote as a Star Wars saga, but we hear from two women, the latter one with her mute child. That encounter, where Herzog no longer spins a tale but lets the woman tell her story is striking. Her tragedy dismisses the cinematic fantasy and burns as hot as any of the lit oil gushers.

It's a small but simple contrast but it sure worked for me. It helped make sure I appreciated the craft of the film, but did not merely "enjoy" the veneer of the film, its searing images and soaring soundtrack.

25 years later, I wonder about that young boy; how and who he is now. I also wonder to a lesser degree about those shots of some workers re-igniting the oil wells after working so hard to put them out, that was such a symbolic shot, if not lesson, in the darkness. Apologies to future children of flame wars...

Herzog elaborates on the burning oil fields

[Horst_In_Translation · 6/10 · 31 July 2016]

"Lektionen in Finsternis" or "Lessons of Darkness" is a 54-minute live action documentary from 1992. The writer and director is Werner Herzog and we also get to hear his great voice on several occasions narrating stories about the contents of this film, especially early on in here. The topic here are the burning Kuwaitian oil fields in the Middle East. I personally must say that it is a subject I knew about, but never had much interest in. Herzog changed this, but only slightly. It was interesting to watch this documentary, but it is still nothing that I would do research on myself. There is another documentary from the same year on this subject which is narrated by Rip Torn, considerably short and also not as known as Herzog's work. And yet that other one managed to score an Oscar nomination. I also agree with these who say Herzog's work is better. Maybe the reason is that Herzog did not really try to elaborate on the political facts and context, but just shows us a depiction of video recordings that describe the state of Kuwait, its people and the brave men trying to extinguish the fires. I remember especially one scene from the very end when people set an oil fountain on fire and Herzog asks if it is not possible anymore to live without the burning oil for these people. This scene could have come off as fairly pretentious when other filmmakers had made it similarly, but Herzog somehow gets away with it and it is even one of the best moments of this fairly short full feature documentary. I recommend the watch here and this film keeps up my opinion that Herzog can always be relied on. i also felt sometimes that this reminded me occasionally of Herzog's "Fata Morgana", only that it has more political context and more oil and fire and less Leonard Cohen and Lotte Eisner, even if I still like "Fata Morgana" more. The tone and atmosphere felt fairly similar. Go see both of these. You will hopefully not regret it.

What a awesome piece of life trapped in film

[shaianferronato · 10/10 · 24 June 2022]

This film is gorgeous.

Can't stop thinking about human behavior and the whole mecanism that we made and keep developing day after day. Always getting complexer and better. What we already passed trough, this whole amount of time and knowledge in our backs.

This movie got me trippy. Made me feel part of this movement. I can't drive my car without thinking about it anymore.

I totally recomend this film. Masterpiece.

Godspeed You, Black Werner

[owen-watts · 7/10 · 16 September 2023]

This brutally formless documentary about the firemen going in to clean up the ravaged oil fields after the Gulf War was derided at the time for decontextualising the war and turning it into meaningless art. Werner is the perfect existentialist lens through which to see this sort of atrocity against nature - and looking back at it three decades later in our boiling future it looks unfathomably worse. These unspeakable atrocities, not just against people, but our shared world. They don't deserve narratives. I'm glad as he matured even further as a documentarian he lost the penchant for title cards - because their pomposity and frequency here undermines the message somewhat.

Unexpectedly impactful and unsettling

[I_Ailurophile · 10/10 · 26 August 2022]

The stark, sweeping visions of vast, desolate landscapes and destruction beyond imagination; the stirring classical pieces filling the soundtrack; the filmmaker's sparse, detached narration, and even more scant interviews with select individuals: I don't know what aspect of 'Lessons of darkness' is more arresting and impactful. There are portions of this - some of the visuals themselves, and the way they were captured - that on the face of it would be beautiful, in a way both majestic and sad, if they weren't so sorrowfully haunting in recognition of the meaning of the imagery, and what precipitated it. Rarely if ever has Werner Herzog removed himself so much from his subject, rather presenting as a visitor from another planet, and in that especially dispassionate observation lies a power that to some degree unexpectedly surpasses the filmmaker's works in which he assumes a more active role.

The feature is so ruefully plainspoken that it surely wouldn't hold much appeal for moviegoers who don't already engage with documentaries generally, or who aren't enamored of Herzog specifically. The majority of these 54 minutes is simply unadorned footage of the aftermath of a swift but terrible conflict - an aftermath that is devastating in more ways than can be succinctly recounted. Yet this is all 'Lessons of darkness' needs to be to make its mark; any viewer with the capacity to See, and Feel, without being Told, will understand for themselves the dreadful, awe-inspiring horror each shot and segment portends. Herzog has made very clear his ambition with this picture, and he achieves it: the sights to greet us are spellbinding, extraordinary, alien, and uniquely disquieting; they are, however, also unquestionably of Earth.

It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words, and in this case that is painfully true. Herzog's fascination with humanity, in all its complexity good or ill, is here revealed through a selection of scenes in which humans are heavily deemphasized if not altogether absent. Even so, the knowledge we possess of the part human activity plays in turn speaks volumes about our capabilities - not even for "good" or "evil," but for creation, or destruction. As if to emphasize the point: the handful of words of narration provided in the twelfth segment, "Leben ohne Feuer," directly addresses this conflict of potential, and in so doing rivals the footage itself in very effectively evoking unease in the discerning audience.

No, as a matter of personal preference this won't be for everyone. Still, there's an incredible artistry and weight in the presentation that's difficult to describe without seeing it for oneself. If you have so much as an inkling of curiosity about non-fiction features or Werner Herzog's prolific oeuvre, 'Lessons of darkness' is an essential watch.

Lessons of Darkness

[quinimdb · 7/10 · 16 May 2016]

"Lessons of Darkness" is a visual meditation on the nature of destruction. It is a short 55 minutes in length and has little talking, but it is exactly as long as it needs to be. It shows natural destruction and human suffering and looks to explore why they exist. Much of the greatness of the film is not just the philosophical points it raises through its imagery, but its dark and gloomy atmosphere, that makes it feel like you're staring into the abyss of Hell.

The film shows a city ruined by its inhabitants, and uses these visuals and few words to express thoughts about nature's relation to destruction. The film suggests that destruction is inherent to nature and humanity, as people feel the need to hurt other humans, while nature exists in a constart state of potential destruction, as evidenced by the opening shot which shows a man encountering an alien on another planet, and the first thing he sees is fire roaring behind him. Because of this, everything around us can be completely changed as we know it at a moments notice. Destruction lives in us as it does in nature, constantly lurking beneath the surface, disguising itself as life like the oil lakes disguise themselves as water. We attempt to suppress this destruction but when we can't, we just use what we have at our disposal for our own personal benefit. However, when we do successfully suppress the destruction, we realize we lose purpose without it, showing why destruction is a part of nature. Without a fire to extinguish, what's the point?

It's really hard to give a numerical score to this one.

[planktonrules · 20 July 2012]

I'm not even going to try rating this Werner Herzog film. It isn't because it's bad--it's just that for the life of me, I have no idea how to score it--especially since it's unlike any other movie I have seen--and I've seen a lot! See it for yourself and I think you'll see what I mean.

This film was made around the end of the first Gulf War in Kuwait and Iraq. Mostly, it consists of shots of the damage from the war on the landscape--particularly, but not exclusively, the oil wells deliberately destroyed by retreating Iraqi troops. I remember at the time, folks saying it would take DECADES to put out all the fires and clean up the mess. But, this was all crazy hyperbole and the cleanup was amazingly short--and so apparently Herzog and his crew had to rush there to document the hellish aftereffects of the war. Interestingly, the film is NOT about who was or wasn't at fault (though it did show the torture equipment used by the Iraqis)--more just an odd vision of the war's end. I say odd because the film was filled with unusual classical-style music, Herzog's strange narration and lacked the formal structure of a documentary. It's sort of a case where you just sit back and suck it all in--and it's not in any way like a typical Hollywood film! Well filmed but probably not everyone's cup of tea!

a documentary masterpiece

[lorisclara · 10/10 · 8 May 2017]

For me this is the best documentary I have ever seen. The images are amazing. And as always Werner tells an fabulous story. I can't stop to watch it. Music gives the film something magical even the "brutal" images. This is for sure my favorite film of Werner Herzog. It takes one the breathe away.