When Werner Herzog makes a new documentary, you can always count on one of the most satisfyingly strange occurrences in nonfiction filmmaking: the dulcet Germanic tones of Mr. Herzog making odd connections and going deep into the mystic, even when he’s talking about science.
His new doc, “Theater of Thought,” doesn’t contain anything as wonderful as Herzog’s musings on prehistoric radioactive crocodiles in “Cave of Forgotten Dreams” or his dismissal of dogs too stupid to know about geologic history in “Fireball: Visitors From Darker Worlds.” But letting the 80-year-old Herzog loose to explore the human mind is predictably fertile territory, in which serious scientific inquiry must make room for questions like these, posed to various scientists and researchers by our director and interlocutor:
“Do fish have souls?”
“How stupid is Siri?”
“Does a mouse suspend disbelief?”
“Could a dying man send a message (through a computer-brain interface) that there is a heaven?...
His new doc, “Theater of Thought,” doesn’t contain anything as wonderful as Herzog’s musings on prehistoric radioactive crocodiles in “Cave of Forgotten Dreams” or his dismissal of dogs too stupid to know about geologic history in “Fireball: Visitors From Darker Worlds.” But letting the 80-year-old Herzog loose to explore the human mind is predictably fertile territory, in which serious scientific inquiry must make room for questions like these, posed to various scientists and researchers by our director and interlocutor:
“Do fish have souls?”
“How stupid is Siri?”
“Does a mouse suspend disbelief?”
“Could a dying man send a message (through a computer-brain interface) that there is a heaven?...
- 9/4/2022
- by Steve Pond
- The Wrap
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Having made a film on every continent, tireless searcher Werner Herzog keeps things stateside for Theater of Thought. Even so, he travels far, exploring one of the last great frontiers, the human brain, from a rich multitude of angles. The result is one of his most piercing inquiries yet.
In Silicon Valley and in the laboratories and conference rooms of academia, he speaks with more than two dozen people working at the forefront of neuroscience and neurotechnology, the catch-all term for cutting-edge inventions that link the nervous system to electronic and other devices. Herzog is the clear-eyed student — at times amazed and delighted, and, at others, skeptical and alarmed. Amid the cryostats and nanoparticles and fiber optics, the clunky gadgets and impenetrable-to-the-layperson diagrams, he summons a wry and lyrical mix of awe and foreboding.
Like his 2020 doc, Fireball, a film that studied meteors through chemistry,...
Having made a film on every continent, tireless searcher Werner Herzog keeps things stateside for Theater of Thought. Even so, he travels far, exploring one of the last great frontiers, the human brain, from a rich multitude of angles. The result is one of his most piercing inquiries yet.
In Silicon Valley and in the laboratories and conference rooms of academia, he speaks with more than two dozen people working at the forefront of neuroscience and neurotechnology, the catch-all term for cutting-edge inventions that link the nervous system to electronic and other devices. Herzog is the clear-eyed student — at times amazed and delighted, and, at others, skeptical and alarmed. Amid the cryostats and nanoparticles and fiber optics, the clunky gadgets and impenetrable-to-the-layperson diagrams, he summons a wry and lyrical mix of awe and foreboding.
Like his 2020 doc, Fireball, a film that studied meteors through chemistry,...
- 9/4/2022
- by Sheri Linden
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Altitude Films has debuted a new trailer for Ric Burns’ documentary ‘Oliver Sacks: His Own Life.’
Oliver Sacks was a man of extremes. In his youth, he was a self-destructive rebel who fled London for San Francisco to reinvent himself as a bodybuilding biker, struggling with drug addiction and his own sexuality. In his maturity, he became a pioneering neurologist and the author of best-sellers such as Awakenings and The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat. Filmed just weeks after receiving a terminal diagnosis with full access to the man himself and those closest to him.
The doc celebrates Sacks’ incredible life and reminds us of his most important teaching: that our ability to connect with others is what truly makes us human.
Directed by documentary filmmaker Ric Burns, the film features exclusive interviews with Jonathan Miller, Robert Silvers, Temple Grandin, Christof Koch, Robert Krulwich, Lawrence Weschler, Roberto Calasso,...
Oliver Sacks was a man of extremes. In his youth, he was a self-destructive rebel who fled London for San Francisco to reinvent himself as a bodybuilding biker, struggling with drug addiction and his own sexuality. In his maturity, he became a pioneering neurologist and the author of best-sellers such as Awakenings and The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat. Filmed just weeks after receiving a terminal diagnosis with full access to the man himself and those closest to him.
The doc celebrates Sacks’ incredible life and reminds us of his most important teaching: that our ability to connect with others is what truly makes us human.
Directed by documentary filmmaker Ric Burns, the film features exclusive interviews with Jonathan Miller, Robert Silvers, Temple Grandin, Christof Koch, Robert Krulwich, Lawrence Weschler, Roberto Calasso,...
- 8/12/2021
- by Zehra Phelan
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
“Aware: Glimpses Of Consciousness” will have its U.S. Theatrical Release Starting In Los Angeles On Friday, September 24 (Laemmle Theaters) And New York On Friday, October 8 (Cinema Village).
Directors Frauke Sandig and Eric Black follow scientists delving into the greatest of mysteries, having to confront the ‘Big Questions’. It presents some of the world’s most brilliant researchers approaching consciousness – each from radically different perspectives, including Roland Griffiths, the renowned Johns Hopkins University psychedelics researcher, plant biologist Monica Gagliano, Christof Koch, Chief Scientist of the Allen Institute for Brain Science, and the famed Tibetan Buddhist monks, Matthieu Ricard and Mingyur Rinpoche.
The film opens as a science film but emerges well beyond the explicable, ultimately leading one on a voyage upon the ocean of consciousness, a contemplative, sensual, cinematographic meditation. The networks of consciousness are reflected in ‘grand’ imagery revealing the vast interconnectedness of Nature – from the smallest organisms, to...
Directors Frauke Sandig and Eric Black follow scientists delving into the greatest of mysteries, having to confront the ‘Big Questions’. It presents some of the world’s most brilliant researchers approaching consciousness – each from radically different perspectives, including Roland Griffiths, the renowned Johns Hopkins University psychedelics researcher, plant biologist Monica Gagliano, Christof Koch, Chief Scientist of the Allen Institute for Brain Science, and the famed Tibetan Buddhist monks, Matthieu Ricard and Mingyur Rinpoche.
The film opens as a science film but emerges well beyond the explicable, ultimately leading one on a voyage upon the ocean of consciousness, a contemplative, sensual, cinematographic meditation. The networks of consciousness are reflected in ‘grand’ imagery revealing the vast interconnectedness of Nature – from the smallest organisms, to...
- 8/4/2021
- by Ethan Shanfeld and Selome Hailu
- Variety Film + TV
Oliver Sacks lived a lot of life, putting primacy on the brain throughout his career as a neurologist as the most incredible thing in the universe. But during that life, which ended in 2015, he also battled drug addiction, cancer, homophobia, and a medical establishment that wouldn’t take him seriously for decades. His towering achievements and personal struggles are chronicled in the new documentary “Oliver Sacks: His Own Life,” directed by Ric Burns and coming later this summer. IndieWire shares the exclusive first trailer below.
Sacks, perhaps best known for his literary works “Awakenings” and “The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat,” was an intrepid explorer of cognitive worlds who helped us redefine how the brain and mind work. The film features exclusive interviews conducted with Sacks just weeks after his terminal diagnosis, leading up to his death, along with nearly two dozen testimonials from family, colleagues, patients,...
Sacks, perhaps best known for his literary works “Awakenings” and “The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat,” was an intrepid explorer of cognitive worlds who helped us redefine how the brain and mind work. The film features exclusive interviews conducted with Sacks just weeks after his terminal diagnosis, leading up to his death, along with nearly two dozen testimonials from family, colleagues, patients,...
- 7/22/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
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