MovieChat Forums > Jeder für sich und Gott gegen alle (1974) Discussion > Blind man in the desert

Blind man in the desert

posted 18 years ago by Electric_Head
12 replies | jump to latest

Does anyone know if the beginning of this story that Kaspar tells just before he dies has any significance. I was racking my brain trying to figure out what Herzog meant by this. Maybe the blind man was instinctive like Kaspar and not like the town, or that not everything needs a scientific explanation, that ties in with the brain scene right afterwards. Then I thought i'm probably thinking about this too much, and Kaspar told the story just because he loved the idea of the desert, and telling the story, even though it was only the beginning, was important to him. Any ideas on this scene?

http://www.ymdb.com/electric-head/l38175_ukuk.html

[–] OsbourneRuddock 18 years ago

This is pure guesswork, and probably just a personal interpretation, but you could see the fact that he only has knowledge of the very beginning of the story as being a metaphor for the fact that he never develops beyond having a childlike perspective. In a sense he is trapped in early childhood - much as his story is stuck in it's early formative phase, and never progresses beyond it.

[–] Electric_Head 18 years ago

That's a good take on it, much better than mine. Things like this always confuse me in Herzog films, not so much the ones he did with Kinski but the other ones i've seen have parts that i don't really understand. Heart of Glass and Fata Morgana leave you scratching your head particularly. I really liked Fata Morgana anyway , dont understand what the relevance of the Mayan myth at the beginning is though. I don't think that films really meant to make any sense though.

http://www.ymdb.com/electric-head/l38175_ukuk.html

[–] 18 years ago

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[–] Electric_Head 17 years ago

Thank you, I did wonder that the men had saw mirages but I wasn't sure.

http://www.ymdb.com/electric-head/l38175_ukuk.html

[–] thao 16 years ago

I understood it just like you. The full irony of the story comes forth in the end when they investigate his brain and think that they have found the key to understand him. Talk about mirages in the desert!

- No animal was hurt during the making of this burger -

[–] estocade 10 years ago

huh, nice deduction

[–] wodnerdog 17 years ago

i don't think that it has a fixed meaning or that herzog intended there to be anything in particular to get. 'the city of the north' suggests to me the mythic eight-fold city of god.

[–] johnnyada1 17 years ago

I think this is similar to what the above posters have said, but my interpretation of the story was that it was about using logic to find his way. This makes sense to me as a lot of the film plays on Kaspar's use of logic (The tree frog, the small room for a big building etc) there are more well suited examples, but I cannot remember as I have not seen the film in some time now.

[–] 17 years ago

[deleted]

[–] crussher 14 years ago

There is another possibility to add to the already good interpretations above. Remember when Kaspar first tells the story to Katy, she says that you must only ever tell stories when you know the end. Well, when Kaspar next tells the story, at his death-bed, he does know 'the end', as in the end of his life. Perhaps in his Zen like understanding of things, this is what he thought Katy meant.

[–] kkislal 12 years ago

what about this guess;

the lost people in the desert are like the people in our society. Behaviours of our society avoids us to live different kind of life, experience, an utopia. Blind guy, the pure soul of kasper, feels that we are limiting ourselves with non existing forms that we created in our minds. And his form free thinking(kasper's rule breaking perspective) can bring us to a new city, a new world. We don't know what will happen then(as kasper don't know the end) but we just need to experience it.

[–] elkabousmehdi 10 years ago

Spot on. Cheers