My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done? (2009)

My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done?

Directed by: Werner Herzog

Starring: Michael Shannon, Willem Dafoe, Chloe Sevigny, Udo Keir, Grace Zabriskie, Brad Dourif

Released: 2009

Country of Origin: USA

Runtime: 91 min.

If you're going to watch this movie, you should at least look into who made it before deciding if this one is for you. It opens up with the words: "David Lynch presents a film by Werner Herzog." Now, for me that by itself leads to uncontrollable happiness and child-like hand clapping. For the unaware, it means you're about to enter into ninety minutes of surreal madness and be presented with a puzzle that will never be solved, nor was it meant to be. Both Lynch and Herzog live in a world where film conventions mean absolutely nothing. They don't play nice and will lead you on paths and trails that possibly have no meaning and may not even have anything to do with the "story" you're presented with. I think you should know what you're in for before watching this, it's a bit of a fans only type feature and I can't imagine many of you enjoying it without prior knowledge of how these unique filmmakers work and an appreciation of the lens in which they view the world. While it's not either filmmaker's best work, it's still a wonderful chunk of weirdness that I throughly enjoyed.

Based on the true life story of a disturbed man who kills his mother with a giant antique sword, the film takes great liberties with the true life story. Herzog claims around 70 percent of the film is fictitious and only loosely based on what actually happened. Conventional truth doesn't matter in a Herzog film, he takes a subject and tries to find what he calls the "truth behind the truth." Micheal Shannon plays the matricidal crazy man, Brad McCulum who becomes a little obsessed with a play he is performing in, randomly decides to become Muslim on a fateful trip to Peru, and sees the face of God in a box of oatmeal. He plays the character with such vivid intensity that it recalls Herzog's own infamous work with the enigmatic psychopath Klaus Kinski. Herzog knows exactly how to portray madness and has done so with great success throughout his long career( see: Aguirre, The Wrath of God, Woyzeck, and last years Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans). The cast is rounded out with Willem Dafoe as the homicide detective working on the case, Chloe Sevigny as Brad's girlfriend, and cult actor Udo Kier as his theater director. They are joined by two veterans of Lynch's films, Grace Zabriskie as Brad's overwhelmingly kind mother and the always awesome Brad Dourif as his racist ostrich farmer uncle. You may recognize Dourif from his performance as Grima Wormtongue in The Lord of The Rings trilogy.

The plot line is pretty straight forward for the most part. Where the strangeness comes in, is how Herzog presents the events. Both Herzog and Lynch have a keen ability to make the ordinary seem sinister and the mundane uncomfortable. Long takes, moments that seem like freeze-frames but in reality have the actors holding real still for extended periods, and Micheal Shannon's buggy eyes, all add to the sense of dread and foreboding that permeate throughout this feature. Much of it takes on a dream-like quality, like the flashbacks to Peru at one of Herzog's favorite filming locations, the Urubamba River, and a long sequence of Shannon walking through a market in China. The market scene was one of my favorites from the film, it's long and seems to have no real connection to the rest of the film, but is none the less mesmerizing.

With this film, Herzog is more concerned with the why as opposed to the how. He digs deep into the psychosis of Brad McCullum, providing vignettes of his descent into murder and madness through flashbacks via his girlfriend and theater director. While you get a clear picture of his illness, no real reason or catalyst is given to explain his strange behavior. It's mentioned that after his trip to Peru, he came back a little different, but that doesn't seem to quite cover it. In Peru, he is with a group of extreme rafters who take on more then they can chew and end up drowning. This would be the logical reasoning for his mental collapse, if it weren't for scenes showing an odd change and general strange behavior from Brad before his friends perish. Was there something else in Peru that caused the shift? There is almost a supernatural atmosphere to the Peru scenes and it's not hard to imagine an outside force messing with Brad's head. Yet, that seems far to simple. It appears Herzog has such respect towards madness that he doesn't assume anyone can really understand what drives people to insanity. It's a refreshing viewpoint in a cinematic world where audiences seem to need to understand everything and have the answers to their questions spoon-fed to them.

FINAL VERDICT: When approaching a Herzog or Lynch film, you have to throw out any and all ideas of how a film should work and know that you don't have to necessarily understand everything that happens. If your able to toss those ideas away and let the beauty and strangeness just wash over your senses, you're in for a treat. Herzog is an acquired taste and My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done? is not the best place to start. If your interested in his works, I'd start with Aquirre, The Wrath of God (which was my first Herzog experience) or maybe some of his documentary features such as, Grizzly Man, Little Dieter Needs To Fly, or Encounters At The End Of The World. If you're into this kind of film already, you might dig this, although I'm aware that a lot of longtime Herzog fan didn't. I'd agree there are many greater films in Herzog's catalog, but I had a great time with it and its occasional moments of beauty. There are also some shots of an ostrich stampede, which is just plain cool.