The Rogue Film School will be in the form of
weekend seminars held by Werner Herzog in person at varying locations
and at infrequent intervals.
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The number of participants will be limited to a maximum of 65.
Locations and dates will be announced on this website and Werner Herzog's website:
www.wernerherzog.com approximately 12 weeks in advance.
The Rogue Film School will not teach anything technical related to
film-making. For this purpose, please enroll at your local film school.
The Rogue Film School is about a way of life. It is about a climate, the
excitement that makes film possible. It will be about poetry, films,
music, images, literature.
The focus of the seminars will be a dialogue with Werner Herzog, in
which the participants will have their voice with their projects, their
questions, their aspirations.
Excerpts of films will be discussed, which could include your submitted
films; they may be shown and discussed as well. Depending on the
materials, the attention will revolve around essential questions: how
does music function in film? How do you narrate a story? (This will
certainly depart from the brainless teachings of three-act-screenplays).
How do you sensitize an audience? How is space created and understood
by an audience? How do you produce and edit a film? How do you create
illumination and an ecstasy of truth?
Related, but more practical subjects, will be the art of lockpicking.
Traveling on foot. The exhilaration of being shot at unsuccessfully. The
athletic side of filmmaking. The creation of your own shooting permits.
The neutralization of bureaucracy. Guerrilla tactics. Self reliance.
Censorship will be enforced. There will be no talk of shamans, of yoga
classes, nutritional values, herbal teas, discovering your Boundaries,
and Inner Growth.
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Related, but more reflective, will be a reading list. Required reading:
Virgil’s “Georgics”, Ernest Hemingway’s “The Short Happy Life of
Francis Macomber”, and Baker's "The Peregrine" (New York Review Books
Edition published by HarperCollins). Suggested reading: The Warren
Commission Report, “The Poetic Edda”, translated by Lee M. Hollander
(in particular The Prophecy of the Seeress), Bernal Diaz del Castillo
“True History of the Conquest of New Spain”.
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Required film viewing list: The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948,
dir. John Huston), Viva Zapata (1952, dir. Elia Kazan), The Battle of
Algiers (1966, dir. Gillo Pontecorvo), the Apu trilogy (1955-1959, dir.
Satyajit Ray), and, if available, “Where is the Friend’s Home?” (1987,
dir. Abbas Kiarostami).
Follow your vision. Form secretive Rogue Cells everywhere. At the same time, be not afraid of solitude.
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