The Dark Glow of the Mountain is a 45 minute documentary where Mr. Herzog follows Reinhold Messner, the world’s first to climb all 14 peaks over 8000 m, in an attempt to climb in a single take two Gasherbrum mountains, with no oxigen tanks or other funny tricks to help.

Basically, yet another Herzogian character, conquerer of the useless, in the tradition of Aguirre, Fitzcarraldo, Timothy Treadwell, Dieter Dengler, testing its resistance against nature’s implacable force and indifference. Hurray!

In retrospect, Herzog’s documentaries transform to be more and more about himself rather then the subject on hand. Before leaving camp, Messner holds a short instruction meeting with Herzog where he designates him the leader of the expedition in his absence, and tells him how to take care of everything in case the attempt fails and Messner dies.