WERNER HERZOG EATS HIS SHOE (:20)

In 1979 the German director Werner Herzog celebrated the debut of Errol Morris' film Gates of Heaven by honoring a vow he made to Morris to eat his shoe if Morris ever actually made one of his films he was always talking about.  This film documents Herzog publicly cooking and doing just that, while expressing his belief that people must have the guts to attempt what they dream.

Directed by:  Les Blank. 
 

GATES OF HEAVEN (85 min.)

Hailed as one of the top 10 films of all time, this remarkable documentary explores the unlikely topic of Southern California pet cemeteries and their owners.  While well-known masterpieces like The Seventh Seal and 2001: A Space Odyssey explore the human search for meaning in a somewhat ominous and grandiose fashion, the rarely seen Gates of Heaven is a smaller and more humorous movie about actual people and the peculiarities of their lives.  At first, this documentary seems to be little more than an amusing argument that "truth is stranger than fiction." But slowly and effortlessly, a beautiful and heartbreaking tapestry of fascinating individuals and sublime ideas begins to emerge on the screen.  Transcending its surface subject, the funny, bizarre, and earnest debut film by Errol Morris (The Thin Blue Line, A Brief History of Time) discloses, through its lonely characters, remarkable thought and feelings about such monumental subjects of death, work, failure, immortality, love, and the elusiveness of the American dream.

Directed by:  Errol Morris.