Happy People: A Year in the Taiga
Music Box Films | Release Date: January 25, 2013 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
74
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 16 Critic Reviews
Positive:
12
Mixed:
3
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
SalonAndrew O'HehirJan 26, 2013
The resulting film is both beautiful and fascinating, and offers a thrilling travelogue through a spectacular landscape few of us will ever see first-hand. Read full review
90
Village VoiceAlan ScherstuhlJan 22, 2013
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 full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesSteven BooneJan 24, 2013
Like "Grizzly Man," Herzog's latest documentary, Happy People: A Year in the Taiga is mostly built around another filmmaker's priceless footage. Read full review
83
The A.V. ClubNoel MurrayJan 23, 2013
The pleasure of Happy People comes from watching these men go about their work, while they explain that the only way to make it in the taiga is to do and take exactly what's needed, and not get greedy. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBarbara VanDenburghMar 1, 2013
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. And that longing makes the title’s veracity a little suspect. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesBetsy SharkeyFeb 14, 2013
Herzog has become a master of the understatement — knowing just how long the images can sustain you without a word being said. Vasyukov and his team of cameramen gave him a stunning range to work with, so the filmmaker keeps his own narration to a minimum. Read full review
80
SlateDana StevensJan 26, 2013
Happy People's images of the Taiga, while often breathtaking, come from the standard visual language of nature documentary: in between interviews with villagers, cutaways to icicles hanging from branches or dawn breaking over an expanse of snow. It's Herzog's inventive use of voice-over that elevates the film above an extremely well-researched episode of "Nature." Read full review
80
NPRScott TobiasJan 24, 2013
At bottom, though, Happy People celebrates the hard-won freedoms that living in the Taiga offers those who are willing to confront its challenges. There are few places on the planet where the strictures of society don't apply, and the trade-off for fending off bears and minus-50-degree weather is the opportunity to lead a pure, solitary life. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeMark FeeneyFeb 15, 2013
“Happy” isn’t meant ironically. Herzog, who narrates, clearly loves, and envies, the trappers’ elemental existence and connection to nature. Read full review
75
New York PostFarran Smith NehmeJan 24, 2013
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. "Happy People" is the title, but it's virtually all men. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterFrank ScheckJan 30, 2013
While the original version's four hours might have made for wearisome viewing for Western audiences, Herzog's 94-minute cut feels just right, fully immersing us in this rarified world without lapsing into tedium. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenFeb 27, 2013
It’s not that Happy People is uninteresting – its presentation of previously unknown, distant lives is full of lots of interesting tidbits. It’s just that the one sensibility of which we were previously aware – that of Herzog’s – is indiscernible, as if frozen beneath all this movie’s ice. Read full review
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