Werner Herzog has often praised the book "The Peregrine" by J.A. Baker as one of the greatest books of the twentieth century, and has alluded to the fact that Baker had great flight envy.
“Baker desires to become the hawk. He does have flight envy… He wants to fly and —. So do I. I’ve wanted to fly all my life.” he said in an interview.
Through his writing, Baker doesn't merely observe the Peregrine, he becomes it. And I think that Werner Herzog does that too.
His life's work is to seek the adequate images and the ecstatic truth, and he has toiled for it all his life, climbing volcanoes, hauling a ship over a mountain, surviving in the jungle etc.
But then there's Kaspar Hauser. He doesn't strive for the ecstatic truth, because it is the only truth to him. “It dreamed to me…” he said, treating his dreams as reality. He was happier in bed, doing nothing but exploring his inner world, than going outside and being part of the "society".
To me, Werner Herzog envies Kaspar Hauser. He envies his innocent eye, and his ability to think only in terms of ecstatic truth. The truth Herzog spent his whole life chasing, that came naturally to a boy who spent most of his in a cellar.
Maybe historically, he didn't really envy him, and was just fascinated by Hauser's story. But that's the accountants' truth. The Ecstatic Truth I have gotten from the film is that:
"Every Man for Himself and God Against All" is to Werner Herzog, what "The Peregrine" was to J.A. Baker.
(I prefer the translation of the film's original German title to its English one)
