96% Cave of Forgotten Dreams

All Critics (99) | Top Critics (25) | Fresh (95) | Rotten (4) | DVD (1)

"Cave of Forgotten Dreams" is another lovely stanza in the epic poem of humanity that Herzog has been writing for half a century.

To call "Cave of Forgotten Dreams" a great movie isn't just an understatement, it's a wildly inaccurate way to describe an experience that, in its immersive sensory pleasures and climactic journey of discovery, more closely resembles an ecstatic trance.

Art history lessons don't get much better: "Cave of Forgotten Dreams" presents the world's oldest paintings captured by one of film's great visionaries.

We're never going to be allowed in this place, so thanks, Werner, for inviting us along.

What we come to love about Herzog's documentary is Herzog's love itself.

It was the birth of the modern human soul, and cinematic explorer Werner Herzog's fantastic "Cave of Forgotten Dreams" is the delivery-room video.

Art and history as seen through the eyes and mind of perhaps the most idiosyncratic filmmaker of all time.

They emerged with a film that is supposed to be an art documentary, but is really a kind of immersive fever dream and time machine.

Spectacular and absorbing,coinciding with the publication of Jean Auel's "The Land of Painted Caves."

Always the philosopher, Herzog is not content to simply document what is inside the cave. Rather, he uses the images as a launching point for a series of essentially unanswerable questions

A haunting, evocative work...the rare film about art that can be considered a serious work of art itself.

Herzog's glimpses of the future can be as otherworldly and singular as his perspective on the past.

We will likely never be able to see this amazing place in person. Thanks to Herzog for giving us the next best thing.

...equally intrigued by the prehistoric painters of yesteryear and those who study their work today.

Cave of Forgotten Dreams transcends all conventional applications of 3-D filming and projection to record the oldest show on earth.

[M]ay be the first absolutely essential 3D movie, one that you must see in 3D to appreciate its full potency...

strongest sequences occur while simply viewing the paintings without narration

In the end, the 3D is a distraction; I'd prefer more off-the-wall mini-profiles of odd characters, like the circus juggler turned pal?ontologist, to tracking shots of stalactites backed by a chanting soundtrack.

It's impossible to overstate the beauty of the Chauvet paintings: horses, rhinos, bison, and many other species flow around the curved walls of the caves...

Herzog's documentary on the wondrous Cave of Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc is a true dazzler in the dark.

The art on display in Cave of Forgotten Dreams is so jaw-droppingly beautiful that it can move a viewer to tears.

Herzog brings 3D to the art-house documentary crowd

When he stays quiet and we're privileged to spend time with these 30,000-year-old works, "Cave" is magical.

Herzog and cinematographer Peter Zeitlinger have documented a natural wonder of the world that most of us will never see in person but thanks to Cave of Forgotten Dreams now have the opportunity to experience in a manner that's almost as good.

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Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/cave_of_forgotten_dreams/

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