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Well, talk about serendipity: this week, through February 22, Siskel Film Center is screening Herzog’s latest (not counting Rescue Dawn, which isn’t yet in release), the semi/quasi/crypto “faerie land” documentary The Wild Blue Yonder, to provide a critical case in point. Local critics haven’t been kind, and it’s not hard to see why. Haphazardly throwing together large chunks of drab utilitarian footage (NASA astronauts lounging around in space, etc) with weird, hallucinatory views of antarctic undersea fauna and interpolated shots of Brad Dourif doing his maniacal best to bring Klaus Kinski back to (not of this) earthly life—obviously Herzog misses that guy a lot—the film is nothing if not its own unearthly mess.
But “is it any good”? Well yes, well no, and I guess it all depends. Not something I’d care to stick a “must-see” label on . . . except not to see it seems almost criminally neglectful. So: better to take your chances and go . . . and yes, you all know who you are.
