Werner Herzog: Rescue Dawn (2007)

[Chris Knipp]

It fits neatly among Herzog's tales of men of awesome willpower confronting unwieldy environments. What makes Rescue Dawn "mainstream" is basically that its protagonist is perhaps Herzog's most likable and sympathetic protagonist and that his real-life adventure happened to have a happy ending. Herzog pays great attention to the minutiae of captivity and escape in a manner that reminded me of Bresson's A Man Escaped, hardly popular entertainment for the masses.

"It fits neatly"-- yes; perhaps too neatly? But is Bale's Dengler a figure on a scale with Herzog's other ones? What makes Rescue Dawn also "mainstream" besides the likeable protagonist and happy ending is the fact that it reads in the format of a P.O.W. escape film, a fairly familiar genre or sub-genre; and it is also getting more mainstream promotion and distribution than Herzog's earlier drama features.

Yes, he pays "great attention to the minutiae of captivity and escape." But so do many prison or captivity escape films from various decades and countries that one could name. Does Rescue Dawn really resemble the austere, tireless, repetitive A Man Escaped more than other escape films?

I wish you had said more specifically about Rescue Dawn than these few lines, Oscar.

I'm glad you read the New Yorker "making of" piece and liked it, though.