Wings of Hope
Dir: Werner Herzog
2000
****
In 1971 Werner Herzog was filming Aguirre, Wrath of God in the Peruvian jungle. He was due to fly from Lima to Pucallpa on the 24th of December but his place on the flight was canceled after a last minute change in itinerary. The plane, a Lockheed L-188A Electra turboprop, flew through a vicious lightening storm about a third of the way through the journey and was ripped apart but the sheer force of the wind and turbulence. The plane wasn't built for such conditions but the pilots were under pressure to meet holiday schedules by the airline. The crew and passengers all lost their lives apart from one seventeen year old girl called Juliane Koepcke. She later recalled; "The clouds became darker and darker and the flight became more turbulent. Then we were in the midst of pitch-black clouds and a proper storm with thunder and lightening. It was pitch-black all around us and there was constant lightening. Then I saw a glistening light on the right wing. The motor was hit by lightening." Koepcke fell into the Amazon Rainforest two miles below while still strapped to her seat. Despite sustaining a broken collar bone in the fall, a deep cut to her arm, an eye injury and concussion, she was able to trek through the dense and unforgiving Amazon Jungle for ten days and found shelter in a hut where she waited for the owners, local lumbermen, who took her by canoe back to civilization. It was later discovered that around fourteen other passengers survived the fall but were less able to find help and died in the jungle. Herzog became fascinated with Koepcke's story, as did the world, but his interest also came with deeply unsettling feelings of luck, chance and fate. Herzog has always been hands on in his documentaries, interviewing and interacting with subjects, but never before (or since) has his presence mattered more. Not just because he was involved in the history of the event, but also because Koepcke was so rigid, and clearly uncomfortable with appearing on camera. It took him almost thirty years to find Koepcke and get her permission to make the film as she had shied away from media attention. The pair retrace Koepcke's journey, travelling on the same flight and the same seats they would have sat on and then through the jungle, starting at the crash site and ending at the same hut where the lumbermen lived. Together, they find previously undiscovered bits of wreckage and meet one of the lumbermen who took Koepcke back to safety. It is largely a factual film with Herzog putting his feelings aside and rightfully letting Koepcke tell her story. It would have been nice to hear more of Herzog's musing on fate and luck but he made the right decision in letting her have centre stage. A simple but fascinating made for television documentary.