Salt and Fire (2016) Reviews

• Less of a thrill than a warning

  quothage2017-04-06

  I had to wonder what I was watching throughout, consistently waiting for something to happen. Salt and Fire delivers a film which is more like a patchwork quilt. Bits and pieces of ideas designed to be thought provoking but, in a typical arty style, leave you to draw your own conclusions to the meaning. So it allows itself to be watchable, just about, without anything of significance taking place. The only thing I took from the whole thing was that sometimes people who like nice stuff make bad decisions and then have to face their demons. The acting was stilted throughout. Even Michael Shannon, who I tend to consider at least reasonable, played his part in keeping with everyone else. I still wonder whether it was intentional, perhaps some device designed to make you ask why. Interesting idea, but it probably deserves a more fitting synopsis. This isn't a thriller and certainly isn't a disaster movie or maybe it is, if the film could play out for another 200,000 years.

• Herzog, Kafka and a cosmologist walk into a bar

  gcastles-354172017-04-13

  Werner Herzog is known for pushing boundaries in his films. He has gone to the extreme ends of the earth and walked alongside a madman dragging a Spanish galleon over the mountains to create unique cinema. Salt and Fire is in itself a film about extremes: Extreme environmental conditions, and extremists who kidnap scientists who come to study these conditions. As a man-made ecological disaster unfolds in a South American nation, three scientists from the United Nations embark on a journey to discover the extent and causes of the disaster, only to be kidnapped by armed men and held hostage. What unfolds from here is a swirling tale which flirts with surrealism and science fiction. At times this felt Kafkaesque to me, as the kidnappers refuse to answer the simplest of questions and respond with non-sequiteurs. This flirtation with fantasy had me wondering what was to come... and a visit from aliens seemed the most likely scenario. Perhaps this feeling of unreality I was experiencing was cognitive dissonance, driven by the appearance of cosmologist Laurence Krauss on screen. This is his first turn as an actor and I suppose he must be on sabbatical from the University of Arizona to be appearing in films where he isn't explaining the universe for us. He does tell us a bit about the major non-human player in the film, the "Salar de Uyuni", a salt lake high in the Andes which is world's largest flat surface. "Satellites use it to calibrate their distance from the ground," he says. As head of the UN envoy Professor Laura Sommerfeld (Veronica Ferres) and head kidnapper Matt Riley (Micahel Shannon) drive out onto the salt, we learn it is expanding at 800 square miles per year, as the nearby dormant volcano threatens to become active and destroy life on earth as we know it. But it is here the story begins to unfold, and Riley's plans as a kidnapper are revealed. You'll have to see for yourself whether or not aliens turn up. Herzog films can be challenging, and judging by some other reviews there are people who clearly hated this film. I did not. While the ending is a bit unsatisfying, overall the originality of the story kept me interested. Like most of his films, this is more of an experience than a story; but the story is there. When someone is kidnapped, we expect it to be a life changing experience, and that is exactly what Sommerfeld withstands as the film unfolds; however it is not in a way which we expect. This is definitely a film for Herzog fans, with his trademark use of astonishing scenery and sparse dialogue coming together to create something we've never seen before. There are some interesting scenes using a single camera, such as one within a moving vehicle panning around from the back seat to the front to reveal the vast emptiness of the salt lake. The contrast between the verdant gardens of the compound where the hostages are held and the sea of desolation is juxtaposed by the types of prisons these two environments represent. And within all this is a visit to the train cemetery where pre-WWII trains used and abandoned by a long extinct mining industry rust and rot, a typically extraordinary location common to Herzog's films. This is not Herzog's best film, but is certainly enjoyable and vastly more original than the majority of films released in 2016.

• Someone should have thrown salt on this slug

  jordan22402017-07-17

  Take my rating with a grain of salt (pun intended), as I wasn't able to get passed more than about 30 minutes of this movie. As others have already noted, acting was surprisingly bad (given I think Shannon has been very good in some films), pace moves about as fast as aforementioned slug, and the whole kidnapping makes no sense. First, there was absolutely no need for it, as the kidnappers could have simply made their issues known to the scientists via normal communication channels, and why would you bother disguising yourself, then just randomly reveal your identity, which wasn't known to the victims anyway? But it did feature one of the silliest attempts to avoid being kidnapped I've seen in something that wasn't considered a comedy (the head thrust into the gut and feeble swing of a brief case), so that was kind of entertaining. Can't believe this was by the same guy that brought us 'Grizzly Man,' though this was a rather grizzly attempt to make a non-documentary film, so perhaps the two are related. Apparently this took only 16 days to film. That's about how long it seemed to take that first half hour to pass.

• Eco Thriller with Twist

  Raven-19692016-10-15

  Being afraid of the dark is one thing, yet being afraid of the light is far worse. A United Nations delegation composed of three scientists, Laura, Krauss and Fabio (Gael Garcia Bernal), visits the Uyuni salt flats of Bolivian in order to help draw attention to an environmental tragedy taking place. However, as soon as the delegation lands its members are kidnapped by a militia controlled by businessman Matt Riley (Michael Shannon). As in paintings where the images change depending on the angle from which they are viewed, what Riley wants with the scientists gradually comes into focus in a thrilling and ingenious way. The film's location practically steals the show; an immense salt flat with a looming super volcano. Fortunately the setting is not the only aspect of the film that is thrilling. Capable acting and directing, and an intriguing environmental theme, combine with other elements to make Salt and Fire a compelling picture. I love the intellectual candy including great quotes from Alexander the Great and Ecclesiastes. Sometimes, however, it is a little too awkward and slow moving. More oomph/depth is needed at critical points. Gael Garcia Bernal is wonderful and funny, but he has just a minor part. There is a fantastic twist at the ending. Seen at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival.

• A Real Misfire for Herzog

  Michael_Elliott2017-04-19

  Salt and Fire (2016) * 1/2 (out of 4) Three scientists are on their way to give a report to the United Nations when they are taken hostage. Laura (Veronica Ferres) is the main focus as one of the kidnappers (Michael Shannon) wants to make sure she realizes what a greedy company can do to people and their environment. Werner Herzog is one of the most fascinating filmmakers to ever grace film buffs yet there's no question that something went horribly wrong with this picture. Herzog has a brilliant mind and probably a mind that is a lot more intelligent than the majority of the people who watch his films yet for the life of me I don't know what he was trying to do with this picture. He wrote the screenplay so I'm sure he was trying to get some sort of message across about ruining the world that we live in but it comes as a pretty epic fail. SALT AND FIRE is a very weird film and a very bad one at times. Again, I'm sure Herzog had something in mind but sadly it just didn't come to life on the screen and the end result is a rather boring and flat film. It starts off as a hostage/thriller type of picture yet there's never any suspense and for the life of me I can't even see where the director even attempted to build any. I'm really not sure what the entire point of this opening kidnapping was if you weren't going for some sort of suspense. Things don't get much better once the lead scientist and her taker begin to form a strange relationship. Again, what the point of this was is rather confusing because it just doesn't play out in the picture. We then get another set up with the woman out in a salt field with two blind children. I think these sequences are the most interesting in the film and I'm sure something great could have been done with this alone but it just wasn't to be. Even these scenes are full of bad moments where there's just no pay off or anything of real interest. Both Ferres and Shannon are good in their roles but there's just so much any great actor can do with mediocre parts. The film does features a rather nice and unique music score and I'd argue that the cinematography was very good as well. The film was shot in Boliva and we've got some terrific visuals to look at but sadly just about everything else is flat. SALT AND FIRE is a real misfire from a legendary director who usually delivers much better.