Into the Abyss (12A)

HHHH

Dir: Werner Herzog

Running time: 107 minutes

FROM Little Dieter Needs to Fly to Encounters at the End of the World, Werner Herzog has proved himself to be the most elegant and surprising of documentary makers. So it is with his latest film, the quietly brilliant Into the Abyss, which takes the well-explored subject of capital punishment and makes it riveting.

He does so by deploying the simple yet effective method of allowing real people to tell their stories and keeping himself out of matters as much as possible. It sounds like a basic of documentary making, a rule by which every filmmaker should abide, but it is surprising how often ego and the need to impose one's will on a subject gets in the way. Herzog could be said to have been guilty of too much interjection in the past, of having too powerful a personality.

This film, though, is different. Herzog doesn't just speak to the people involved in his subject; he gives every indication of having listened to them as well. Crucial thing, listening. It can make the difference between interviews that are a collection of recycled soundbites and processed emotions, or it can bring new insight and startling truths. You will find the latter in Into the Abyss.

Capital punishment is proving to be something of an obsession for Herzog. Last week Channel 4 began showing a series of his interviews with death row inmates (the next one is tonight at 10pm). Why pay cinema prices to see more of the same, you might be wondering. Well, at 107 minutes instead of an hour, Into the Abyss, subtitled A Tale of Death, a Tale of Life, allows Herzog to look more widely at the impact of a crime. In his effort to give the whole picture, this often chilling, but always measured, film has echoes of Truman Capote's In Cold Blood.

The crimes in question were committed in Texas in 2001. Two young men, Michael Perry and Jason Burkett, were found guilty of murdering a mother, her son and his friend. The motive: stealing a car they coveted. Burkett was given a life sentence, Perry was sent to death row, which is where we first meet him.

Polite and eager to please this strange new visitor with the foreign accent and a camera, Perry acts at first like any other interviewee, largely because Herzog treats him as such. Initial impressions are that there is not much that is remarkable about this young man, other than the terrible crimes he perpetrated.

We learn a little more about him as the film goes on: it is not the familiar story of abandonment and emotional abuse. His parents, he admits, were supportive. He just didn't want to live by other people's rules. Herzog doesn't spend much time trying to fathom Perry's outlook, preferring instead to look at the ripples of the crime.

Those waves stretch far indeed. We hear from the relatives of the victims, and from the police who carried out the investigation. Piece by piece, using crime scene videos and witness testimony, a picture emerges. Finally, we hear from someone whose job it was to assist in executions, taking prisoners through their final day.

By far the most heart-rending testimony comes from the sister and daughter of one victim. By talking us through the events of that day, and what happened later, we follow the grisly trail of revelation and devastation. Without fuss, but not without tears, this interview is a reminder of how the families of murder victims never receive parole.

If that testimony is poignant, the interview with Burkett is an altogether flatter, but in its own way deeply disturbing, affair. He has faced up to what happened, and though looking at a long spell in prison, 40 years, knows that one day he will be released. Why was he spared the death sentence? For that Herzog turns to Burkett's father for an explanation. Talk about man handing on misery to man.

This would not be a Herzog documentary without a few jaw-dropping moments, which stem from both his searching questions and what some of the interviewees have to say for themselves. There is a trademark animal inquiry: "Please describe the encounter with the squirrel," he prompts a chaplain. The genius of Herzog's questions is that though on the surface unconventional, and occasionally so far out of leftfield you'd need a telescope to see them, they get results.

At the Glasgow Film Festival in February, where the film had its premiere, a packed screening received the film in near silence. Now and then a laugh or a gasp pierced the hush, affording some relief from the intensity of the emotions on display. While one might be tempted to look away when a memory is too much or a scene is too upsetting, it is to Herzog's endless credit that he never does.

Glasgow Film Theatre; Cameo, Edinburgh; Belmont, Aberdeen, from tomorrow-April 5