Freaktana A Major Disappointment

Numerootno A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Philippa All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

bigverybadtom Presumably the title is meant to be somewhat ironic; the people depicted certainly aren't happy all the time, but have a rugged life.The box is not entirely accurate; it says that it describes a way of life little changed for centuries. However, while the movie does describe a group of natives whose way of life is dying out, the film concentrates mainly on people sent in by the Soviet government decades ago to do hunting and trapping.Unlike other Herzog movies I've seen, the people depicted are far from quirky or weird. They are normal and rational people living the only way to live in their locale, trapping furs to sell, buying few outside supplies (such as tools and snowmobiles) as needed, but otherwise building their own cabins, trapping and hunting their own food, depending on their dogs but treating them without sentiment. The film concentrates mostly on the trappers and their routines; you see little of their wives and families.The people are happy in the sense that they have the freedom to act on their own instead of having to follow orders, I assume.

stonepitts-776-994232 This is billed as a year in the life of a small village in the Taiga, where the indigenous people live happily (and sustainably) as they have for 100s if not 1000s of years. I call BS. This is not the life of a village. This is the life of a handful of men who work for the cash (outside) economy by trapping fur meant for export to big cities. They are, apparently, men who were sent there by the Communist government 40 years ago who have managed to survive by subjugating the local indigenous and by treating their dogs like crap. There are few women or children shown and no other townspeople. This is Werner Herzog's romantic paean to the Paleo white male hunter-trapper culture. They are not indigenous, they are not representative of the village, they are not even, as far as I could tell, happy (unless morose philosophizing in Russian can be considered happiness). WTF??? I knew Werner was a romantic, but I didn't know he was so trapped in his imagination. This movie is ridiculous.

dickmacgurn Werner Herzog brings us to the Taiga, a frosty paradise in which modern day fur trappers use both old and new technology to thrive in an expansive wilderness much larger than the U.S., often at temperatures below minus forty degrees. These trappers are expert outdoors-men / survivalists / hunters that have perfected the art of trapping sable with the help of their dogs.I learned how to make and set various types of traps, build a canoe from hand, catch pike fish from a frozen river, make homemade insect repellent, protect my food rations from bears and mice, and much, much more.I have few if any legitimate complaints about this excellent film. Herzog doesn't fail to mention the cruelty that the animals suffer, including the poor hunting dogs which often don't live long in the harsh conditions. One of the hunters admits to feeling pity for his prey, but that he prefers slaughtering sable rather than farm animals, a job he had decades before.My favorite part of the film is when one of the hunters is making his way back to base camp through dense forest on his snowmobile, a breathtakingly beautiful commute to say the least. Another was when the camera goes underneath the frozen river to show the nets catching the pike fish. On New Year's Eve the hunters return to the village via snowmobile over the frozen river, and Herzog points out that some hunters make their dogs run the entire distance in a day, an astonishing 150 kilometers, (93 miles). No wonder the dogs often live short lives, especially if the hunters push them so hard. I did also wonder how long the hunters are expected to live.As a vegan, I feel especially sad that animals suffer to bring their furs to the market, but I didn't deduct any points for it. It's an excellent look at a culture that is as unlike my own as any I could imagine. 8 stars, definitely worth a second or even 3rd viewing!

Roland E. Zwick "Happy People: A Year in the Taiga" is the latest in a series of nature documentaries by Werner Herzog (here with co-direction by Dimitry Vasyokov), this one chronicling life in a Siberian village over a twelve-month period. Bakhta is located alongside the Yenisei River in the Taiga Forest, and the inhabitants there have been eking out an existence under some pretty challenging conditions for centuries now (this is Siberia, after all). We watch as they make preparations for trapping, build cabins in the wilderness, fashion out canoes from old tree trunks, fish in the river, fend off bears and mosquitoes, and store up supplies for the brutal winter to come. For this is life as it is lived in one of the most misbegotten outposts of civilization. As Herzog himself says, these people resemble early Man from a distant ice age. And, yet, as the title implies, the inhabitants of Bakhta are far from unhappy with their lot.This is reflected most in the many wise and canny observations about the value of hard work and the cyclical nature of life emanating from one of the town's most seasoned citizens, a sort of rural philosopher who's been trapping in that area ever since the Communist government dropped him off and left him to fend for himself more than forty years ago. It is his commentary, more than even Herzog's own voice-over narration, that draws the viewer into this strange and unfamiliar world, one that is striking in both its harshness and its stark beauty (the image of a massive river of thawing ice heading swiftly northward during the spring is not one that will be easily forgotten). This isn't Herzog's most innovative work by a long shot, but if anthropological studies are your preferred fare, this movie will surely fit the bill.However, a warning may be in order for the hypersensitive viewer: this is NOT a movie that comes with the proviso, "No animals were harmed in the making of this film."