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Werner Herzog

German film director, producer, screenwriter, actor and opera director (born 1942)

  • Fame61.6
  • Momentum0.0
  • Wikipedia153.6K
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Source-basedFalling
Born 1942 · age 84Germany
Germany flagGermanyDirectorsMovie Director

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  • Wikipedia
    68 languages
    Cross-language footprint
  • Age
    84
    Born 1942
  • Known for
    Penguins of Madagascar
    2014
Summary
Updated 2026-06-21

Herzog makes films where people haul steamships over mountains, hypnotizes his entire cast, and drags crews into jungles and onto glaciers because the derangement on camera has to be real. The method isn't metaphor—it's the point.

Biography

About

Born in Munich in 1942, Herzog started making films at 19 with Herakles in 1961 and became a driving force of New German Cinema. His work pairs ambitious lunatics on-screen with equally unhinged shoots: he directed Klaus Kinski through five volatile features between 1972 and 1987—Aguirre, the Wrath of God, Nosferatu the Vampyre, Woyzeck, Fitzcarraldo, Cobra Verde—then turned their mutual hatred into the documentary My Best Fiend in 1999. Across fiction (The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser, Stroszek, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans) and documentary (Grizzly Man, Encounters at the End of the Wo…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Werner Herzog

Werner Herzog
said
I believe the common denominator of the Universe is not harmony, but chaos, hostility and murder.
— "Grizzly Man" (2006)
Werner Herzog
said
Of course we are challenging nature itself and it hits back. It just hits back.
— Burden of Dreams (1982)
Werner Herzog
said
I am so used to plunging into the unknown that any other surroundings and form of existence strike me as exotic and unsuitable for human beings.
— 31 May 1981 diary entry (pg. 248 of Herzog's book Conquest of the Useless)
Werner Herzog
said
If you switch on television it's just ridiculous and its destructive. It kills us. And talk shows will kill us. They kill our language.
— Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe (1980)
Werner Herzog
said
If you want to do a film, steal a camera, steal raw stock, sneak into a lab and do it!
— Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe (1980)
via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA
Deep cuts

Filmography

Low confidence
Deep cuts

TV credits

Low confidence
Deep cuts

Awards

Low confidence
  • Golden Lion
  • European Film Academy Lifetime Achievement Award
  • Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
By the numbers

Score breakdown

The six component signals behind the Fame score, and their ranks across the leaderboards.

Fame
Falling
61.6
Composite of search demand, mentions, audience & graph footprint.
Score components
Historical29.3
Source confidence70.0
Completeness80.0
Global rank
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Country rank
—
Category rank
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Receipts

Sources

  • Wikipedia
    wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org
    High confidence
  • Wikidata
    wikidata · wikidata.org
    High confidence
  • Pantheon 2.0
    database · pantheon.world
    High confidence