Peter Bradshaw

The mystery of Werner Herzog

The film director’s long-anticipated memoir is a dervish dance of anecdotes within which the real life still remains secret

Herzog is attacked with a machete by Klaus Kinski during the filming of Cobra Verde in 1987 – their fifth and final collaboration. [Alamy] 
issue 21 October 2023

  • Every Man For Himself and God Against All

    Werner Herzog, translated by Michael Hofmann

    Bodley Head, pp. 355, £25

Many movie actors are famous for their unmistakable voices – people like Sean Connery, John Wayne and Peter Lorre, who all pub comedians mimic. But how many directors are like that? Only one: the German auteur Werner Herzog, hero of the New German Cinema, who at the age of 81 has published this headspinning, free-associating memoir.

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