Cave of Forgotten Dreams

Werner Herzog bridges a gap 30,000 years long when he takes us to southern France’s Chauvet cave in his latest documentary Cave of Forgotten Dreams. This site of the oldest known cave paintings was discovered in 1994, and had been sealed for about 20,000 years pior. This allowed its paintings to remain fresh and for glorious champagne pink calcite to grow and sparkle upon nearly every surface. Shortly after its discovery, it was sealed once again by the French government.

In true Herzog fashion, he plows through obstacles to show us the unknown and unseen. We appreciate the journey all the more after he outlines the numerous restrictions to shooting, such as the film crew’s confinement to a two-foot wide walkway. He interviews the charming, often animated research team. They shed light on the purpose, techniques, and merits of the paintings. Most eerily, we see the path of a single cave painter whose handprints consistently show a crooked pinky finger throughout the cave. The Paleolithic painters used the rounded walls of the caves as dynamic canvasses and Herzog astutely chooses 3D to enhance their artistic choice. We witness the film crew’s discovery and the reverence for the people who displayed artistic sensitivity so mind-bogglingly long ago. The doc is filled with poetic moments, as Herzog probes into the origins of art, humanness, spirituality, and the continuing evolution of life on earth, which he illustrates in an odd but thought-provoking postscript of albino alligators swimming in nuclear plant water.

You won’t see this anywhere else.

Cave of Forgotten Dreams is now playing

Running time: 95 minutes

Trailer