Happy People: A Year in the Taiga (2010)

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

It appears that is can! However great this film is it has no comparison with the original movie - "BEST DOCUMENTARY" winner "Happy Peolpe" ("Schastlivie liudi") filmed and for the whole year lived by it's director - Dmitriy Vasyukov (Russia). Having been filmed in a distant Bakhta village in Siberia, Russia it portrays the lives of the real heros of our time. Real - in the purest sense of the word, as an an opposite to the fictional and dreamy sex simbols - the only male role-models we have had for centuries) - the REAL fearless man standing one to one to the REAL challenges of true, raw, REAL live. All of this framed by the absolutely mind blowingly gorgeous vastness of the Siberian nature. It is viewable on youtube in original language with English subtitles.

Interesting documentary on the lives of trappers and hunters in deep Siberia, along the banks of the river Yenisei, during the four seasons of the year. For instance, in summer, we see them fishing and collecting nuts and berries. In autumn, we see them preparing traps, collecting and splitting wood and hoarding food as they prepare for the winter, where the weather can be as low as -50 degrees centigrade. They have a hermit, mostly self reliant life style, living in log cabins deep in the forest accompanied only by their dogs, with minimal contact with other people. They also seem to be exclusively male. They have some modern technology at their disposal, though they also live and hunt with traditional instruments. Despite the title, they do not seem particularly happy, they look more like taciturn, silent and reserved, able to make a living with very little. The documentary also had a detour seeing the native, shamanistic, Vodka-ravaged Ket people fishing and building their boats (an interesting fact, not mentioned in the movie, is that the Ket people are believed by anthropologists and geneticists to be the closest ancestors of native Americans). Note: This has been widely credited as a Werner Herzog film, but all the German director did was edit an original Russian TV miniseries directed by Dmitri Vasyukov (he filmed them year round) that lasted four hours into 90 minutes for international release. Herzog also provides narration in his trademark German accented English, accompanied sometimes by his ponderous philosophizing.

"Happy People: A Year in the Taiga" is the latest in a series of nature documentaries by Werner Herzog (here with co-direction by Dimitry Vasyokov), this one chronicling life in a Siberian village over a twelve-month period. Bakhta is located alongside the Yenisei River in the Taiga Forest, and the inhabitants there have been eking out an existence under some pretty challenging conditions for centuries now (this is Siberia, after all). We watch as they make preparations for trapping, build cabins in the wilderness, fashion out canoes from old tree trunks, fish in the river, fend off bears and mosquitoes, and store up supplies for the brutal winter to come. For this is life as it is lived in one of the most misbegotten outposts of civilization. As Herzog himself says, these people resemble early Man from a distant ice age. And, yet, as the title implies, the inhabitants of Bakhta are far from unhappy with their lot.This is reflected most in the many wise and canny observations about the value of hard work and the cyclical nature of life emanating from one of the town's most seasoned citizens, a sort of rural philosopher who's been trapping in that area ever since the Communist government dropped him off and left him to fend for himself more than forty years ago. It is his commentary, more than even Herzog's own voice-over narration, that draws the viewer into this strange and unfamiliar world, one that is striking in both its harshness and its stark beauty (the image of a massive river of thawing ice heading swiftly northward during the spring is not one that will be easily forgotten). This isn't Herzog's most innovative work by a long shot, but if anthropological studies are your preferred fare, this movie will surely fit the bill.However, a warning may be in order for the hypersensitive viewer: this is NOT a movie that comes with the proviso, "No animals were harmed in the making of this film."

This is the quality you dream discovery channel had..maybe they did years ago. We get to follow the lives of fur trappers in remote siberia. It gives insight to how we lived before the 9-5 jobs at least in scandinavia its probably the best wilderness documentary I've seen.Its down to earth and the scenery is jawdropping. Its a hard but honest life and a lot of humanity yet still the wilderness stares back at you from the screen.If you like documentaries with ray mears or expeditions with lars monsen this for you. Without the drama or the smugness of teaching you get to follow how they have learned to live with nature and not against it.And its not focused with misery just because they are off grid and not part of the consumer hysteria (amazing).Its nice for once not having to do a review to warn viewers but instead recommend it. Watch this you will not be sorry.