After eating for a living, it was only 9:00 and
Knowing it was "Doc Week" at Criterion, guaranteeing me multiple documentary choices all week long, I felt certain there was a film with this documentary dork's name on it.
Bingo: "Happy People: A Year in the Taiga."
As if a movie about an indigenous people living in the middle of nowhere, essentially living the same lives their forefathers had for over a century wasn't enough, it was directed by Werner Herzog, possibly the greatest director of "new German cinema."
It didn't hurt that it sounded like just the ticket to redeem myself after learning that there is such a thing as tempura-fried dessert.
There were only five other people in the little theater at the Criterion, less than half a dozen people seeking to escape to Siberia on this cold night.
The film began in Spring and followed several lifetime hunters as they lived their self-sufficient lives in the harshest of conditions.
"You are no hunter without a dog," one tells the camera, introducing the element of dogs into the story.
He set out to chop down a tree to get the perfect wood to make skis, explaining that purchased skis would leave the wearer exhausted given how far he had to traverse to do what he does.
The film's cinematography was exquisite, never more so than a tight shot of a snowmobile arriving through a curtain of icicles, a study in silver and white.
I was fascinated by a scene of one of the native people making a dugout canoe using traditional tools, endlessly chipping away just enough wood before bracing the opening and placing it over a fire to set.
The craftsmanship was a thing of beauty.
Come May when the river finally began to thaw, the village burnt a figure of winter in effigy, an annual tradition no doubt brought about by dealing with a frozen landscape nine months out of the year.
May I just say I'm ready to burn our own Winter effigy any day now?
I was a little surprised at how green and lush Summer was and more than a little awed at the sight of the frozen river breaking up and flowing away in great chunks.
In one scene, an overeager, young dog riding in a canoe with his owner spots a moose in the water and can't resist jumping in to try to catch it.
He'll learn.
Mosquitoes were swarm-like and while one hunter claimed they didn't bother him, his poor dog had blood in his fur from scratching all his bites.
Naturally they had an ancient solution, boiling down birch bark and mixing it with tar that they spread all over themselves and their animals.
Daylight lasts an incredible 20 hours during the summer, so their vegetables grew at a tremendous rate.
So far, that was the first advantage of Siberia I'd seen.
By Fall, the village men had chopped enormous piles of firewood, really walls and walls of stacked wood in anticipation of winter.
It was also fishing time so they set out at night in boats with baskets attached to the front in which a fire burned brightly, attracting fish apparently.
Autumn is when it rains for weeks, just one more of Nature's cruelties for these people.
Finally, it is time for the hunters to set off to hunt, so they toast with vodka "as vicious as jet fuel," leaving their womenfolk standing on the shore.
The voice-over, done by Herzog himself, says that this is when they are "happy people," self-sufficient with only their dogs for company.
We learn that bears are the enemies of the trappers and supplies have to be kept in inconvenient tree houses to prevent bear thievery.
Even so, one of the hunters waxes poetic, saying he feels a part of life out there, life going forward. "There's nothing like having a cup of tea to make you happy."
That's bad news for me since I don't drink tea.
But then the enormity of solitude sets in when Winter arrives, freezing beards and eyelashes.
It's -50 degrees, the days are incredibly short and although the river is frozen solid, there's still lots of fish to be caught, which they fry up, make into fish soup and feed to their dogs.
All except one awful hunter who "is conspicuous in how little he feeds his dog."
It was heartbreaking to see the little scraps of fish he gave to the big, hardworking dog. A chorus of pity was heard from the small audience at the sight of it.
As winter progresses with its routine of hard work and severe conditions ( a -33 degree day is described as unusually warm), one hunter talks about how a bear disemboweled his former dog, Smoky, stroking his current dog as he tells it.
He makes the point that hunting is better than keeping livestock, where you form bonds with the animals you later kill.
As hunters, he says, it's just his job to outsmart the wild animal, plain and simple.
The hunters return to the village for New Year's Eve and Christmas, celebrated on January 6th, necessitating a 150 kilometer trip back, with the dog running all the way.
At no point is the dog allowed to ride on the snowmobile with his owner, Herzog intones.
Call me softhearted, but that seems pretty harsh.
Wives greet husband with kisses and jokes, the village gathers for holiday pageantry, and for a few days, the community is whole again.
But once the celebration ends, the men pack up and take off back into the frozen Taiga to finish out the winter hunting and surviving.
Waving them off, one of the wives looks at the camera and says, "Well, we're alone again."
He smile is wide.
So, class, what have we learned from this cultural snapshot?
Be nice to your animals?
The old ways are fading fast?
Happy people are those who have learned that sometimes men and women get along best when living in separate locations, at least for one long season a year?
Ooh, ooh, I know.
Cheesecake should never be tempura-fried.
Class dismissed.
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