The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser [Jeder für sich und Gott gegen alle] **** (1974, Bruno S, Walter Ladengast, Brigitte Mira) – Classic Movie Review 9265

Writer-director Werner Herzog’s 1974 historical biographical drama The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser [Jeder für Sich und Gott gegen Alle] tells the real-life mystery of a weird young man called Kaspar Hauser (Bruno S, ideal) who appears in the main square at Nüremberg in 1828, with a note saying he was brought up in captivity without other human contact. He can hardly talk or walk.

A professor (Walter Ladengast) befriends him, taking him away from the maltreating rabble who make him a sideshow attraction and the other academics who suggest that he is a freak.

This close companion piece to François Truffaut’s L’Enfant Sauvage is a superb, highly emotional and involving film – one of Herzog’s best. Bruno S, discovered by Herzog after spending two decades in institutions, gives an otherwise intellectual film its heart and soul.

There are classical music backgrounds and so there is no specially composed score.

The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser is also known as Jeder für Sich und Gott gegen Alle and Every Man for Himself and God against All.

Also in the cast are Brigitte Mira, Hans Musaus, Willy Semelrogge and Michael Kroecher.

In the video days it was released by Palace Video (1982) (UK) (VHS) and In the DVD days by BFI Video (2014) (UK) (DVD).

The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser [Jeder für sich und Gott gegen alle] is directed by Werner Herzog, runs 110 minutes, is made by Werner Herzog Filmproduktion, Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen, Filmverlag der Autoren and Zud Deutscher Rundfunk, is released by New Yorker Films (1975) (US), is written by Werner Herzog, is shot in Eastmancolor by Jörg Schmidt-Reitwein, and is designed by Henning von Gierke.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 9265

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