One of our favorite critics in the popular media, Roger Ebert, has been suffering from papillary thyroid cancer and its complications since 2002. In 2007, while sitting in the audience at the Toronto Film Festival, Ebert was surprised and delighted to discover that Herzog had dedicated his Antarctic documentary, Encounters at the End of the World, to Ebert. Unable to speak, as a consequence of multiple surgeries, Ebert composed a letter to Herzog that beautifully sums up the maverick director's work and career.
The Writers Institute will open its Fall 2010 series with a screening of the same film, followed by a talkback with Herzog's friend and producer of the film, Henry Kaiser, and with cellular biologist Samuel Bowser, a star of the film who is affiliated with Albany's own Wadsworth Center of the New York State Department of Health.
