Dolev Amitai’s review published on Letterboxd:
An Herzog film has this feeling, that Herzog presumably puts in his films, that make them appear as if we are simply observing them.
Especially when Herzog himself is narrating his films, it makes it as if the viewer is an alien who came down to Earth to observe the actions of the human beings.
This is sometimes Herzog's intention, like in Lessons of Darkness, or as the actual story as in The Wild Blue Yonder.
Herzog promised this film, set in Antartica, would not focus on fluffy penguins (which is half right, as there is a very brief part about them),
the film focuses more on human nature, our place on earth, the beauty of Antartica, and most of all, the people who work and live in Antartica.
Aside from beaing a beautiful portrait of a harsh land, the film works so well because of its focus on the people.
It is hard to explain what it is, but the people who live in Antartica feel different.
They feel like outsiders to our world, who's only place of comfort is in Antartica, where evertyhing is quiet. Quiet except for the sound of nature.
Why else would people spent so much time living in frozen temperatures, in a land so far away, without the regular comforts of ordinary people?
Herzog does not focus on how animals are dying.
Even though many scientists are telling him the world will end soon, as will the human's reign of the earth, he does not preach to us.
Herzog could have easily made the film be a message about human's destruction of the earth.
But he does not. Instead he opts to portay the land, again as an alien observer.
Herzog travelled to Antartica not to film a heavy handed documentary.
He went there to visit the beautiful land, and on the way filmed what he saw.
Encounters at the End of the World is such a beautiful and lyrical documentary by Werner Herzog, who makes great documentaries as much as he makes great fictional films.
And this documentary is no difference.