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What I continue to find wondrous is that Dieter emerged from his experiences without so much as a hint of bitterness; he was forever able to bear the misery with great optimism … He has been a role model for me, and even today when I am in a complicated situation I ask myself, "What would Dieter do?" - Werner Herzog

Dieter Dengler was a young boy in wartime Germany when he became obsessed with the possibility of flying planes. After emigrating to America as an adult, he ended up in the US Air Force during the Vietnam War. In 1966, he was shot down over Laos whereupon he was captured and placed in a prison camp, where he experienced starvation and torture. Decades after his eventual escape and rescue, Herzog interviews Dengler about his harrowing experiences and returns with him to Laos and Thailand to travel through the sites of those painful months. Little Dieter Needs to Fly is an intimate and powerful documentary portrait of a man changed, but not broken, by his nightmarish experiences. Herzog would return to Dengler's story with his Hollywood feature film Rescue Dawn 2006, which recreates his wartime journey.

M | Adult themes