MEDIOCREMOVIE.CLUB
  • Reviews
  • Side Pieces
  • Shane of Thrones
  • Podcast
  • About
  • Archives
  • Game of Thrones Fantasy

Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World

3/8/2018

1 Comment

 

C+
​2.33

Werner Herzog interviews hackers, roboticists, and the pioneers who created the Internet.

Directed by Werner Herzog
Initial Review by Jon Kissel

Picture
The iconic, unique, jack-of-all-trades Werner Herzog sets his sights on a topic as large as the Internet in Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World.  If that seems like far too big a bite for any documentary to chew, then Herzog is right in line with the characters and real figures he likes to make movies about.  Films like Fitzcarraldo, my personal Herzog favorite, find its protagonist dragging a steamship up steep jungle hills, all so he can corner the rubber market and, through a series of further wild-eyed steps, bring opera to South America.  My favorite of his documentaries, Grizzly Man, is about an animal rights zealot convinced that his love for bears is shared by the bears themselves, until one eats him and his girlfriend. Herzog himself is the hubristic one in Lo and Behold, not for thinking he can master nature through sheer force of will like so many of his protagonists and subjects, but in thinking that he can wrap his arms around a subject so huge.  It’s a move that makes for a film that barely surpasses the level of an unnecessary primer for technology that most people use every day, but big foolish steps are perfectly in keeping with Herzog’s career.

Divided into ten chapters, it’s no accident that Herzog only spends one of the ten on the unalloyed goods of the Internet.  Herzog’s pessimism towards human-run systems shines through. Crowd-sourced protein-folding and the economic flattening of free education pale in comparison to addiction to Warcraft and electromagnetic sensitivity.  Based on the specific scenes and interview snippets that he chooses to include, it would be easy for someone to assume that this film was made by a 75 year old man. Why choose to focus on the Warcraft addict instead of the happy couples whose relationships started in Azeroth (that’s where Warcraft takes place, nerds)?  Lo and Behold provides a strong lesson in perspective and nonfiction editing. The subject is so huge that thoroughness becomes impossible, and therefore the specific slant of the filmmaker becomes apparent by what he chooses to leave in.

​
If I’m skeptical of Herzog’s stance, and I am, it’s not like he’s unskilled of communicating what that stance is.  Herzog’s work distilled to a single word, based on the small percentage that I’ve seen, is hubris. It’s the nerds who birthed the Internet whose hubris he’s interrogating, but theirs is a benign and optimistic version.  If a problem with the present Internet is the viciousness brought on by anonymity, that’s because those founders all knew each other and couldn’t envision a world of egg avatars using their networks to sling racial slurs at strangers or taunt grieving parents.  That short-sightedness leads into a world so completely run by the Internet and its logistical buddy, just-in-time supply chains, that one of those when-not-if natural disasters like a particularly potent solar flare could instantly wipe humanity back hundreds of years.  In that glorious future where the electromagnetic-sensitive finally get some relief, no one’s going to know how to take care of themselves anymore thanks to all the dulling of critical thinking that the Internet has also engendered.

What keeps Lo and Behold from being a barely-compelling rant against modernity is Herzog himself, the charmer.  I love the sound of his voice, from the way he pronounces diapers (di-a-pers) to his deep fondness for the coin whirlpool when he visits the radio telescope.  There’s mostly sarcasm when he laments not being able to talk about the ‘malevolent dwarf druid’ with the recovering video game addict, but there’s some disappointment, too.  Cinematically, Herzog always manages to find an image more potent that his poetic waxings, and here, the winner is either the delicacy of the Japanese robot pouring a glass of juice or the simple pan from burned out factory buildings in Pittsburgh to the gleaming robotics factory immediately next door, like something out of Sim City.

Lo and Behold is fatally flawed in how much it tries to take on, but for me, Herzog’s likable in anything he does.  Some level of drilling down was required here. His movies at least inspire enjoyment, and often times, love. This one is towards the enjoyment end of the spectrum.  If that’s not quite praise, it’s not derision, either. C+

1 Comment
Cooker
4/11/2018 10:06:39 am

Broken up into sections, some were interesting to me and others not so much. I kept waiting for the narrator to scream at me to "get in the chopper." I don't recall this happening. C

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Authors

    JUST SOME IDIOTS GIVING SURPRISINGLY AVERAGE MOVIE REVIEWS.

    Categories

    All
    2017 Catch Up Trio
    80s
    Action
    Adventure
    AI Trio
    Author - Blair
    Author - Bobby
    Author - Bryan
    Author - Chris
    Author - Cook
    Author - Drew
    Author - Joe
    Author - Jon
    Author - JR
    Author - Lane
    Author - Phil
    Author - Pierce
    Author - Sean
    Author - Shane
    Author - Tom
    Best Of 2016
    Best Of 2017
    Best Of 2018
    Best Of 2019
    Best Of 2020
    Best Of 2021
    Best Of 2022
    Comedy
    Culture Clash Trio
    Denzel Trio
    Documentary
    Drama
    Foreign
    Historical
    Horror
    Internet Docs Trio
    Mediocrities
    Movie Trios
    Musical
    Podcast
    Romance
    Round 3.1
    Round 3.2
    Round 3.3
    Round 4.1
    Round 4.2
    Round 4.3
    Sci Fi
    Season 10
    Season 2
    Season 3
    Season 4
    Season 5
    Season 6
    Season 7
    Season 8
    Season 9
    Shorts
    Sports
    Thriller
    Western
    Women In Men's Worlds

    RSS Feed

    Archives

    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014

    Click to set custom HTML