Bill Hader on Aguirre, the Wrath of God

Bill Hader reacts to Werner Herzog's 1972 masterpiece Aguirre, the Wrath of God.

Source: The Movies That Made Me hosted by Josh Olson & Joe Dante

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[DentyOne]

Aguirre is like a half remembered dream. The narrative is simple enough, but the experience is so much more. It's indescribable.

[jamesbarker]

Kinski was out of control...shot into a hut full of extras blowing off a guy's finger, hit another guy on the head with a sword leaving a permanent scar, etc. Constant rages and wrecking stuff. The native extras offered to kill him as a favor to Herzog

[Professicchio]

"Someone sent a 16mm camera back to the past".
HOLY CRAP, that's exactly what I thought the first time I watched Aguirre! It's literally like watching actual footage from the 16th century that miraculously exists.
Completely raw and realistic in a way Hollywood can only dream of....

[mnk]

Aguirre is from a time before CGI: Back then, to film a bunch of men getting lost and going insane in the Amazon chasing an idea you actually had to go get lost in the Amazon and go insane chasing an idea.

[jonbohn]

the opening sequence with the expedition descending into the rainforest, popol vuh's score, the mist in the trees, the closeup shots of the troops struggling in the mud, one of the best opening sequences in cinema.

[carriehallahan]

"The guy you're with is like, Klause Kinski - it just sucks!" 🤣

[cg]

I'm inclined to think of Aguirre as a horror film. A slowly disappearing cast who are victimized by a mostly unseen horrifying enemy as well as their own character flaws of greed and rebellion that are personified in Kinski's amazingly brutal performance. There's only horror, moral ambiguity, and a tonal atmosphere of forbidding dread.

[ggtjr]

As someone Hader’s age and into watching stuff like Aguirre, his imitation of blockbuster in the 90s is spot on 😂

[lissakaye]

The blockbuster encounter is so accurate. I was lucky to have an amazing video store owner who actually watched every movie he put out and had amazing taste.

[carlrosenzweig]

My parents took me and my brother with them to see that in the theatre at an entirely inappropriate age. It scarred me for years lol.

[heimdal]

There is something deeply unsettling about watching a group of people descend into madness. Going from well dressed, well mannered and logical to ugly, dirty, primeval. On top of that it is based on a real story (kind of) and the real Aguirre was a monster, a complete psychopath. That makes it even more disturbing. On top of THAT, he’s played by Klaus Kinski, who was a complete madman. That makes it even MORE unsettling. And then you have the haunting score…

A masterclass in filmmaking.

[phoogoo]

"A-geery...WHAT? Werner...WHAT? Here's Speed 2." Killed me.

[giampaolofini]

"It really feels like it's transporting you to that era of the past...and it's terrible" This film's production was basically dropping the cast and crew into a miserable mountainous jungle like contestants on Naked and Afraid, it takes 3x longer film than anticipated, nearly no money at the start and then it goes to $0 within a week, the cast and crew are starving, sleeping in sweltering tents with 1000 bug bites a night, etc. There have been a few other ambitious projects by young auteurs in historical, primitive settings where everything with the production goes wrong and the people working on it suffer tremendously, yet it ends up making the reality of how hard and unforgiving life in the past was presented to us clearly on the screen. Czechoslovakian film Marketa Lazarova and Russian film Andrei Rublev are similar in this way.

[john_ace]

I can remember watching it on german television late at night in the early 90s. Everything i saw felt dirty and ugly, turning into a kind of hyper-real experience. When the end-credits played i felt like i had lost something and a deep melancholy set in. I could never replicate that feeling again.

[donm]

Highly recommend "My Best Fiend" a documentary about Kinski and how extremely difficult he was to work with.

[fjoa]

This is movie is pure mysticism caught on film.

[chwenhoou]

I saw this film in a college film appreciation course. It was a journey you wanted to escape from, but you felt compelled to finish. The fact that Werner Herzog made more films with Kinski is baffling from an outsider's POV. Herzog must've seen a spark of brilliance within Kinski's madness. Otherwise, Herzog would've taken the native's offer to put him out of their misery.

[CaptPoco]

I watched this in the middle of the night in college... just remember it was like a wild fever dream. Reminds us to never to plunder the 16th century Andes.

[findmestudios]

I first watched this in high school. The teacher had it on VHS and projected it on the wall. It was so surreal. I remember feeling like I was in a trance and when the bell rang I jumped out of my seat.

One of my all time favorite films.

[chimchimchow]

I’m the same age as Bill and grew up in Tulsa. When he made the comment about his local Blockbuster, I died laughing. So relatable.