Happy People: A Year in the Taiga 2010

Mark Feeney, Boston Globe: The film has a relaxed, matter-of-fact feel. Read more

Walter V. Addiego, San Francisco Chronicle: It's a do-it-yourself world that Herzog clearly admires - much of what we see is the men performing the tasks that enable them to survive. Read more

Nicolas Rapold, New York Times: Mr. Herzog is openly inspired, as ever, by the rugged independence of these resourceful trappers, who seem stoic about everything but their faithful dogs. Read more

Tom Keogh, Seattle Times: Herzog is not insincere. His passion for outsize experience has always captured our essential human identity against big backdrops. He captures it again in "Happy People," but this time with a twist. Read more

Noel Murray, AV Club: Vasyukov and Herzog are united in their fascination with the particulars of how to thrive in some of the harshest conditions on Earth. Read more

Barbara VanDenburgh, Arizona Republic: Herzog's longing for the ideological purity in which these lives are lived, free of paperwork and bureaucracy, taxes and technology, drives the film, which lacks an overall story arc. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: "Happy People" seems to strain toward the notion that harsh nature makes for a pure heart. And perhaps it does for some. But all? Read more

Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times: Herzog has become a master of the understatement - knowing just how long the images can sustain you without a word being said. Read more

Scott Tobias, NPR: An inspired 94-minute rumination on the hardships and liberties of a remote culture. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: There is indeed much beauty on display, from the icy Taiga landscape to the age-old trapping techniques passed on through generations. Read more

Farran Smith Nehme, New York Post: The film is both elegiac and amazingly retro, like the nature specials that baby boomers were weaned on - although it's not for animal lovers, unless you have a specific grudge against sables. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Albeit a found film of sorts, Happy People is very much of a piece with Herzog's other work, examining man's place in the natural world, looking at man's history and man's ability to survive, to endure. Read more

Steven Boone, Chicago Sun-Times: What Herzog gleans from Yaskyuov's exhaustive material is a simple observation: The men of the Taiga are heroes of rugged individualism. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: We should be grateful to Herzog for bringing us this remarkable footage, but the real subject of "Happy People" may be his yearning for an imaginary paradise he can't have. Read more

Dana Stevens, Slate: It's Herzog's inventive use of voice-over that elevates the film above an extremely well-researched episode of Nature. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: If you want a taste of life as it must have been for the Voyageurs of old, this documentary is a good place to start. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Titling a documentary about snowbound Siberian fur trappers "Happy People" is not as ironic as it seems. Read more

James Adams, Globe and Mail: It feels too much, finally, like a Hinterland Who's Who instalment writ large, too respectful and plain for its own good... Read more

Michael Atkinson, Time Out: [It's] all interesting and quite Nanook-ish, and the summertime mosquito assault can haunt your dreams. But don't expect the payloads of cosmic irony and mystery Herzog has had occasion to find wherever he goes. Read more

Bruce Demara, Toronto Star: The scenes of the river ice buckling and heaving as the spring thaw sets in are among many that display raw and powerful nature. Read more

Alan Scherstuhl, Village Voice: It's fitting that this film of people making do with what they have should itself look somewhat humble, without lyricism, a work not of beauty but of work-which is the thing that makes it beautiful, no matter who directed it. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: They decidedly don't seem happy. And "Happy People's" decision to skate down the frozen Yenisei without examining their unhappiness more closely leaves a slight chill. Read more