Les Blank, 1982 (9*)
Whether you liked, or even saw, Werner Herzog’s ambitious epic Fitzcarraldo, this documentary on its making is one of the best films about filmmaking ever made. Herzog became so obsessed with his story that he repeated the hero’s prodigious feat: bringing opera to the Amazon rainforest by moving a huge steamship inland over hills and up to a huge lake where it could move around a large area to bring the first opera seen or heard to the natives.

Les Blank and his assistant Maureen Gosling take us to both of Herzog’s film locations in the jungle. His first location became the scene of a border war between indian tribes, so he had to move to another location. Moving the steamship using manpower and pulleys was very dangerous, many crew members and a structural engineer walked off the job; another was bitten by a green mambo and immediately amputated his own leg with a machete – if not, he would have died in minutes. Such are the burdens of filmmaking dreams, and none were more grandoise than Herzog’s insane obsession. Lead actor Jason Robards succombed to dysentery and wasn’t allowed to return to location, so Klaus Kinski completed the film. Herzog also lost Mick Jagger to a concert tour, so this film had many setbacks, and Burden of Dreams becomes a chronicle of Herzog's obstacles to his maniacal obsession - perhaps the most 'larger than life' of all films. This is one of the best documentaries ever made.