These images exemplify a common theme weaved throughout Werner Herzog’s film Encounters at the End of the World. The theme is searching for humanity in an inhuman place. Herzog believes such humanity exists and he attempts to reveal it in Antarctica by focusing on the people that visit the McMurdo station rather than the frozen wild itself. However, a closer look at his work reveals the reality of the situation; humanity cannot be found in an inhuman world. These two stills demonstrate that reality.
The top still arrives early in the film when Herzog visits seal scientists stationed outside of McMurdo. Here the scientists press their ears to the ice to listen for seal calls while an extradiegetic recording of the calls plays in the background. The second still comes later in the film when Herzog visits other biologists at a dive station. Here, a professional diver pivots to face the camera as he ascends beneath the ice. With these shots, Herzog juxtaposes the familiar, the human, with the unfamiliar, the Antarctic wild. He finds the humans in an inhuman place. However, color, clothing and shot composition in these stills expose the people’s inhuman-ness and their misplacement in this setting.
Tones of blue engulf the people in each shot, suggesting their domination by the cold environment. The people’s own hues of black and red stand out against the elements, alerting the viewer to their misplacement. Further, both shots depict quasi-human figures. Antarctic gear obscures their bodies and faces so that only their silhouettes are distinguishable as human. This costuming, so to speak, suggests that human penetration of an inhuman world warps the human, so that she or he becomes unrecognizable. This warping points to the idea that humanity cannot be naturally found in a place such as Antarctica.
Finally, there is something to be said about the shot composition of these stills. It is impeccable, and therefore uncanny. Herzog is only too familiar with cinematographic techniques such as obeying the rule thirds and working with depth of field. In the first shot, he places the horizon in the upper third of the frame, places the people in each lateral third of the frame, and adds depth to the image by placing figures in the foreground and background. The second shot, though not taken by Herzog, symmetrically positions the diver with his arms and head occupying the lateral thirds of the frame, and with two lines in the ice running symmetrically toward his shoulders. These manipulations of shot composition superficially work to conflate the people with their surroundings. The aesthetics are somewhat harmonizing and are suggestive of the people’s rightful place in Antarctic. However, it is precisely this manipulation that renders the shots uncanny. They are too perfect. The composition actually exposes the staged-ness of the shots, reminding the viewer of the unnatural presence of people in this world. Though Herzog finds humans in an inhuman place, his film highlights the idea that they should not be there.
