We watched Klaus Kinski: My Best Fiend last night, Werner Herzog's documentary about his work with Kinski. Really an excellent look at the actor through the eyes of Herzog, who is a little nutty himself, though not quite as much so as Kinski was. There are some great bits like Herzog nonchalantly mentioning his plan to kill Kinski by burning down his house.

What you really come away with is the sense that Kinski really invented himself, became a crazy magnetic juggernaut, bigger than life. The film begins with footage from his "Jesus Tour", a one man show in which he took the part of Jesus and basically ranted at the crowd, and closes with a very moving shot of him with a butterfly flapping around his head, Kinski with a beatific look on his face.

There are a lot of great behind the scenes sequences from Fitzcarraldo (many of which I had already seen in the wonderful documentary Burden of Dreams) and Aguirre, the Wrath of God.

More on Kinski: Klaus Encounters with some great images, a complete filmography, and also a nice Cineaste interview with Herzog..