La Soufrière: Warten auf eine unausweichliche Katastrophe (1977): 7/10
I do think Werner Herzog is an interesting director, and I felt I had to watch this one as there are a few things I do share with him, one of them my passion for volcanoes.
The idea from a film perspective is interesting. Unfortunately due to factors Herzog couldn't anticipate, the eventual events & circumstances were not really favourable to him, although maybe still the preferrable outcome, for now. The interview with the deserted people wasn't all that interesting, I felt. I also understand the perspectives from these people, as I do not fear death myself, and could see myself doing the exact same thing those people did, except for the "endless faith in God" part. However Herzog seems to explore what drives them, but eventually somewhat does the same thing as those people do, by bringing himself somewhat in danger, even though the danger might have been overestimated. I have not researched into those claims that were being made here. Still, the movie is worth a watch, and the images of the deserted city is really interesting and alienating to see.
Earlier this year when caming across this movie, I thought this was about a different volcano, because earlier this year the La soufrière volcano erupted. It was the largest eruption of the year 2021, and still is at this point. However the La soufrière that did erupt was in St. Vincent & The Grenadines, not on Guadeloupe, so this movie mentioned a different volcano. When realizing this, i thought this was about Soufrière Hills in Montserrat, another volcano that in fact had a large eruption somewhere in the 1990s and resulted in the permanent abandonment of the southern part of the island. At the moment, the volcano even seems to give hints or signs to a new phase of heightened activity, i've read. However again, it's not the La soufrière of this movie, adding to some confusion. The La soufrière of this volcano - maybe better known as La Grande Soufrière - to differentiate from the other Soufrières has been relatively calm in recent years, with it's last eruption, mainly phreatic in 1976-1977 - during which Herzog filmed this short movie. In recent years, the volcano has however entered a new phase to unrest, possibly slowly building up to a new eruption, but often volcanoes can surprise us, in a good way and in a bad way. But sooner or later, the catastrophic scenario that was envisioned in this movie will happen. Currently La Palma is erupting on the Canary Islands, and there were a lot of phases of unrests that did lead to nothing during the last decade, but might have been earlier precursors to the eruption that did happen after a new phase of unrest started in september this year eventually did lead to an eruption, and currently it is the largest eruption observed on La Palma since human settlement of La Palma.
I've read some research on this volcano, and from what I understand - based on my knowledge in general - this volcano certainly is capable of those kind of eruptions. It's been a while, but it did happen in the past, and it will likely happen again, but it is impossible to know when. Volcanoes are kind of mysterious, and perhaps that's part of the reason of why they attract me so much.
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... effectief 1 van mijn favo films ooit, en waarschijnlijk mijn 2e meest bekeken.
