My Best Fiend

Werner Herzog looks back on his temptestuous friendship and professional relationship with Klaus Kinski, the maniacal actor with whom the director shared a boarding house as a youth and went on to star in some of his best work (Aguirre the Wrath of God, Nosferatu, Fitzcarraldo), while recounting having to weather (and often encouraging) Kinski's fierce tirades and abuses before his premature death in 1991. My Best Fiend is the kind of documentary that probably sounded better in its initial conception rather than its end result. Though containing some hysterical and outrageous stories and footage, where Herzog's megalomania is just as much on display as Kinski's, this is the kind of work that plays better as part of movie lore than as a documented record. ** 1/2 out of ****