:02:00
And since nobody can pronounce
his name in the Amazon here...
:02:04
he calls himself Fitzcarraldo, and he also
founds a town with the name Fitzcarraldo.
:02:09
There was a historical figure whose
name was Carlos FermÃn Fitzcarrald...
:02:14
a caucho baron.
:02:16
I must say the story of this caucho baron
did not interest me so much.
:02:20
What interested me more
was one single detail.
:02:23
That was, uh,
that he crossed an isthmus...
:02:27
from one river system into another...
:02:29
uh, with a boat.
:02:31
They disassembled the boat and -
and put it together again on the other river.
:02:36
And, uh, that intrigued me to write a story
about big opera in the jungle...
:02:41
and, uh, about a man
who wants to bring Caruso...
:02:46
into Iquitos and build
a huge opera house.
:02:50
And he fails to -
to get the money for it...
:02:53
and so finally he decides
to make his fortune as a rubber baron.
:02:58
And, uh, he buys a territory
which is out of reach...
:03:03
because there are
very, very strong rapids...
:03:06
and you can't move a big boat
into the upper tributary.
:03:10
Um, and for exploiting
an area like this...
:03:13
you need a big boat
for all the logistics and transports and so.
:03:17
And what he does, actually, is that
he moves in a - in a parallel tributary...
:03:22
because he knows there
is one geographical point...
:03:25
where the two river systems
almost join.
:03:27
There's only
one or two miles in between.
:03:30
And with the help of, uh,
1,100 savage Indians...
:03:33
he moves the boat across the -
this mountain ridge.
:03:38
But it all fails because
the Indians release the boat.
:03:41
They untie it,
and it floats downstream...
:03:44
and it crashes through the rapids
and everything was in vain.
:03:48
And still,
with that defeat...
:03:50
Fitzcarraldo is able to turn it
in some kind of a victory-
:03:54
a very painful one, and...
:03:56
that's basically the story of the film.