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Werner Herzog and Klaus Kinski: A Film Legacy by Werner Herzog
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DVD Cover InformationActor: Claudia Cardinale, Isabelle Adjani, Klaus Kinski, Ruy Guerra, Werner Herzog Director: Werner Herzog Brand: Fox Writer: Werner Herzog Producer: Andre Singer Producer: Christine Ruppert Producer: Daniel Camino Writer: Bram Stoker Writer: Bruce Chatwin Writer: Georg Büchner DVD: Region Code 1 Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); German (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo Format: Anamorphic, Box set, Color, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen Picture Format: 1.33:1 Running Time: 648 minutes DVD Release Date: 2004-02-10 Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested) Studio: Starz / Anchor Bay
Movie Reviews of Werner Herzog and Klaus Kinski: A Film LegacyMovie Review: The Agony and the Ecstasy Summary: 5 Stars
For any fan of film, this is one of the most impressive, reasonably priced box sets you could ever hope to find. Contained within are all the collaborations between manic, visionary German director Werner Herzog and his crazed, international movie star muse Klaus Kinski. Both men have had prolific careers, yet nothing they have done separately has achieved the splendor of their collected efforts together. Indeed, in his review of "Woyzeck", Roger Ebert says,"It is almost impossible to imagine Kinski without Herzog; reflect that this `unforgettable' actor made more than 170 films for other directors--and we can hardly remember a one." Wherever their individual paths took them, this box set stands as a monument to the magic between them. Klaus Kinski and Werner Herzog together created films of extraordinary imagery, significant depth, and possessed artistry of the highest caliber. Included in this box set are the five films they did together: "Aguirre", "Nosferatu", "Woyzeck", "Fitcarraldo", and "Cobra Verde". Also included is one of the most fascinating documentaries about filmmakers and filmmaking ever, "My Best Fiend", Herzog's love/hate letter about his relationship with the volatile actor. Each work is unique in scope, vision, theme and performance. If the documentary explains why no director other than Herzog worked with Kinski more than once, their five films together amply demonstrate why Kinski never lacked for work. His on-screen presence is unparalleled and his performances perfectly measured for each role. The DVD set is a repackaging of their prior individual releases, containing the same extras. All films are presented in their original aspect ratio. In summing up the sheer value of this set, one should consider the sublime effect of "My Best Fiend". In chronicling his relationship with Kinski, Herzog inadvertently shows how he was equally a figure who straddled the line between genius and madman during their productions. Although they gave each other their worst, they also brought out the best in the other. It is as palpable a symbiotic relationship as you will ever see between two human beings, and it can be witnessed on every frame of these five films. As Herzog said to Roger Ebert when describing his first encounter with Kinski as a youth, "At that moment I knew it was my destiny to make films, and his to act in them.'' This set is a tribute to that revelation, and a must for anyone who savors the artistry of filmmaking.
Summary of Werner Herzog and Klaus Kinski: A Film LegacyAguirre, The Wrath of God in Full Frame Presentation (1.33:1) Woyzeck in Anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1) Cobra Verde in Anamorphic Widescreen (1.77:1) Nosferatu in Anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1) - German Language Version Fitzcarraldo in Anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1) My Best Fiend in Anamorphic Widescreen (1.77:1)
The six-film Herzog/Kinski boxed set is a sleek compilation of a visionary cinematic collaboration. The history of cinema is dotted with great directors who have found an actor whose face, voice, and style capture that director's point of view: Josef Von Sternberg and Marlene Dietrich; John Ford and John Wayne; Martin Scorsese and Robert DeNiro. In 1972, the German director Werner Herzog cast Polish actor Klaus Kinski in Aguirre, the Wrath of God--the result was perhaps the definitive film for both. Kinski had previously made almost 100 films, but his malevolent role--as a Spanish conquistador obsessed with finding gold--shot him into international stardom. Though Herzog and the volatile Kinski were at each other's throats through much of the filming, seven years later the director cast Kinski as the tortured vampire of Nosferatu, Phantom of the Night (a color remake of the silent horror classic) and the title character of Woyzeck, based on the classic expressionistic German play about a jealous, unstable soldier who murders his lover. Both films continued the Herzog-Kinski trademark of intense unflinching emotion and the palpable presence of the raw physical world. In 1982, Fitzcarraldo carried this ethos to new heights as Kinski portrayed a man who, in order to bring grand opera to the depths of Peru, has a huge steamship hauled over a mountainside using ropes, pulleys, and human endurance. The mad ambition of the film matched that of its hero as Herzog repeatedly placed crew and actors at risk of their lives. Nonetheless, the love-hate relationship between the director and his star carried them into one last film, the uneven but still remarkable Cobra Verde, about a Brazilian bandit sent to Africa to reopen the slave trade. After Kinski's death in 1991, Herzog made a documentary, My Best Fiend, about their decades of collaboration; the result rivals their previous work as a testament to human extremity. --Bret Fetzer
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