Heart Of Glass - The Silence Of Madness

#WernerHerzog #HeartOfGlass #Glassblowing
Heart Of Glass - The Silence Of Madness:
This week's video essay examines what could be one of Werner Herzog's least accessible dramatic works, the hypnotic Heart Of Glass! A film which focuses on obsession, loss, and the spread of madness, Heart Of Glass suspends narrative convention in favour of meditative pieces which paints a larger portrait of a fictitious 18th century Bavarian village on the cusp of its own undoing. Slow, dreary, and often dimly-lit, Heart Of Glass is terrifying in its silence and stillness.

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[YouHaveBeenWatchingFilms]

How do you feel about Heart Of Glass? How do you feel it compares to Werner Herzog's other works? Which films would you recommend to those who loved Heart Of Glass? Thanks for watching!

[kazy]

I haven't seen this movie but the scene with the clouds alone made me beyond curious. Its was gorgeous and somehow incredibly creepy.

[Birmanncat]

Ive seen it 4 times. Cant get it out of my mind.

[brightmooninthenight]

Thank you, this helped elucidate some important things. The inability to have purity. The sin of being human and the madness of desiring perfection. I have fallen into madness many times.
In fact the glass factory was creating beautiful art and he burns it down because it can no longer make Ruby. Its a metaphor of the saying "don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good"

The scene of the man dancing with the corpse is a parallel of the inability to accept loss, like the inability to accept the loss of Ruby, or the loss of purity. The Virgin is killed in the master's madness.

I felt the seer was the director himself somehow.
The end of them rowing across an abyss in search of an abyss and the implication that the birds will feast on their corpse. The search for something lost is a search across an abyss for an abyss.
The end was a summation of the entire film. Them rowing for the non existent Ruby.

I deeply relate with this film and feel it mirrors myself in many ways. Especially since I am prone to mental illness and obsession. In a way this film is kind of healing in its message... Its clarified something I wouldn't have been able to articulate without having seen this video.
Thank you so much for this video
I feel this is a film that will reveal deeper meanings every time I watch it.
Lastly I want to say you did not mention in this analysis how funny this movie is. Its downright hilarious at times.

[jame]

'Heart Of Glass' sounds like a truly curious and capitivating film from the aspects you've drawn out and I love the idea of it devoting time to glassblowing as a craft. I haven't seen enough of Herzog's works to make any sweeping statements but the elements of obsession and madness sound quite fitting from seeing Fitzcarraldo and Aguirre.

[richardandrewz]

Wonderful analysis, thanks. I've seen so many films over the years, including 'arthouse' (a silly term), horror and many genres, but HoG is by far the most unsettling..and yes I've seen Salo. I love slow, contemplative cinema, but watching the actors under hypnosis ( if indeed they all were, certainly not the narrator, one original reviewer suggested some were stoned on LSD) is truly disturbing. The only film I'm unable to see in one sitting, I feel drawn into a trance like state watching it. Anyone approaching this visually strange film for the first time, beware!!

[liltick]

I’m just going to make the same comment as I did months ago, and tonight repeatedly.. I like all of what u cover. All of it. So many of my favourites on your channel.

[palimpsestowa]

i want to finally get into herzog's films, so it is a good start for me, thanks a lot for this video 🐈

[KarlosMorale]

I do love these on a Sunday night. I do think though maybe you need to watch some trash for a bit. I'm a firm believer that they occasional fray bentos pie and instant mash helps you better enjoy fine dining 😂