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I kept hearing about Encounters at the End of the World at the end of last year, and once I realized it was another Werner Herzog movie, I added it to my queue. His tendency to go to the far ends of the world continues in this film, and that tendency is taken to its farthest extreme since he visits the South Pole. He is invited by Discovery to come and see what researchers and scientists are doing there and document whatever fascinates him. There are endless possibilities. What cracked me up about the beginning of this movie is Herzog's impatience. He arrives at McMurdo and is instantly disappointed by what he sees because it looks like any other small industrial town, and as the movie's narrator, he expresses his desire to get out of McMurdo, get past the survival training, and get out into Antarctica.

For me, though, the most interesting people Herzog meets are the ones in the town. Everywhere he goes, he seems to bump into intellectuals doing manual labor and odd jobs. I loved listening as each person told the story of how they got to be "at the end of the world". The title of the movie implies that Herzog must have been aware of this as well. This isn't a Planet Earth type of documentary. There are animals, to be sure, and sweeping underwater shots accompanied by eerie chorale music, but as unique as they are, it's the people in McMurdo that prove to be the most intriguing subjects.

I know that Herzog is always a character in his own documentaries, but he seemed to be a little more opinionated in this one than I've seen him in his other movies (although I've a long way to go on the list). It bothered me a little bit, but not enough to turn me off completely. I know that I'm always picking on music as well, but my personal tastes found some of the music to sound a little bit too loud and even a bit gratuitous.

I'm happy to have seen Herzog's take on Antarctica and its inhabitants. I learned some things I didn't know and pondered some new ideas. It was slightly disappointing, but overall still quite good. I'm glad it got recognized by the Academy this year, but also glad Man on Wire got the win.