Werner Herzog
Born: 1942-09-05 in Munich, Allemagne
Known For: Directing
Biography
Werner Herzog (German: [ˈvɛɐ̯nɐ ˈhɛɐ̯tsoːk]; born 5 September 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, author, actor, and opera director, regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema. His films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with unique talents in obscure fields, or individuals in conflict with nature. He is known for his unique filmmaking process, such as disregarding storyboards, emphasizing improvisation, and placing the cast and crew into similar situations as characters in his films. Herzog started work on his first film Herakles in 1961, when he was nineteen. Since then he has produced, written, and directed more than sixty feature films and documentaries, such as Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972), The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (1974), Heart of Glass (1976), Stroszek (1977), Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979), Fitzcarraldo (1982), Cobra Verde (1987), Lessons of Darkness (1992), Little Dieter Needs to Fly (1997), My Best Fiend (1999), Invincible (2000), Grizzly Man (2005), Encounters at the End of the World (2007), Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009), and Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010). He has published more than a dozen books of prose, and directed as many operas. French filmmaker François Truffaut once called Herzog "the most important film director alive." American film critic Roger Ebert said that Herzog "has never created a single film that is compromised, shameful, made for pragmatic reasons, or uninteresting. Even his failures are spectacular." He was named one of the world's 100 most influential people by Time magazine in 2009. Description above from the Wikipedia article Werner Herzog, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Filmography
2026
- Ghost Elephants as Narrator (voice)
- Hulk Hogan: Real American as Self
- Bucking Fastard ... (Writer)
- Soccer Meets America as Self
- Celebrity Caregiver ... (Executive Producer)
2025
- Felicidad ... (Producer)
- Sirena
- Reeling ... (Executive Producer)
- Mi casa amarilla ... (Consulting Editor)
2024
- Orion and the Dark as Narrator (voice)
- The End ... (Executive Producer)
- The Fire Within: A Requiem for Katia and Maurice Krafft as Narrator (voice)
- Theater of Thought ... (Director)
- About a Hero
- Celebrating the Rice Media Center as Self (archival footage)
2023
- The Arc of Oblivion as Narrator (voice)
2022
- Werner Herzog: Radical Dreamer as Self
- Tegoyo as Self (Voice)
- Last Exit: Space as Narrator (voice)
- Nosferatu: A Film Like a Vampire as Self (archive footage)
- Flores del precipicio ... (Producer)
- Notes from a Dromedary ... (Creative Consultant)
- El Poso ... (Producer)
2021
- A Life for Movies: Lotte Eisner as Self
- Meteor: Sohrab Shahid Saless as Self
- Hannelore Elsner: More Than One Life as Self (archive footage)
- The Extravagant Little Life of Jean-Claude D. Dreyfus as Self (archive footage)
2020
- Disney Gallery / Star Wars: The Mandalorian as Self - The Client
- Fireball: Visitors from Darker Worlds as Self - Narrator (voice)
- The AGFA Mystery Mixtape Vault as (archive footage)
- Wim Wenders - Von Filmen und Träumen as Self
- The Andinist as The Painter (Narrator)
- Wim Wenders, Desperado as Self
- AGFA Mystery Mixtape #2: Later in L.A. as (archive footage)
- Dear Werner (Walking on Cinema) as Narrator (voice)
2019
- The Mandalorian as The Client
- The Last Scene ... (Executive Producer)
- Meeting Gorbachev as Self
- Family Romance, LLC ... (Director)
- Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin as Self - Interviewer and Narrator (voice)
- Tattoo Uprising as Self
- Jihad in Hollywood as Self
- 90 Years of the Music Box Theatre as Self
- Love Birds ... (Consulting Producer)
2018
- The Great Buster: A Celebration as Self
- The whole world is country ... (Consulting Producer)
- The Golden Gate ... (Executive Producer)
- The Empty Goal ... (Thanks)
- Manaslu: Mountain of Souls as Self
- Film Beyond Cinema: The Dumpster Kid Experiment and Other Utopias as Self
- Paradox Bullets as Narrator (voice)
- I'm a Soldier as Self
2017
- Ballad of a Righteous Merchant as Self
- Werner We Love You as Self
- A Gray State ... (Executive Producer)
- The Man Who Killed John Wayne as Self (archive footage)
- One Hundred Years with Juan Rulfo as Self
2016
- Salt and Fire as Man with One Story (uncredited)
- Into the Inferno as Self
- Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World as Self
- Jihad in Hollywood as Self
- The Blimp-Maker ... (Thanks)
2015
- The Late Show with Stephen Colbert as Self - Guest
- Close Up with The Hollywood Reporter as Self
- Queen of the Desert ... (Director)
- Freaks of Nature as Perfect Being (voice)
- Red Army ... (Executive Producer)
2014
- Late Night with Seth Meyers as Self - Guest
- Penguins of Madagascar as Documentary Filmmaker (voice)
- The Look of Silence ... (Executive Producer)
- Life Itself as Self - Filmmaker
- Atari: Game Over as Self (archival)
- Alfonso Sansone: Producer by Chance as Self (archive footage)
- Lemonade War as Neighborhood Hero
- Werner Herzog: On Death Row and Life as a Director as Self
2013
- Rick and Morty as Shrimply Pibbles (voice)
- Jack Reacher: When the Man Comes Around as Self
- The Unbelievers as Self
- Home from Home – Chronicle of a Vision as Alexander von Humboldt
- From One Second to the Next ... (Director)
- The Last Shepherd ... (Thanks)
- Werner Herzog and Errol Morris on 'The Act of Killing' as Self
- An Appreciation of Les Blank by Werner Herzog as Self
- Mistaken for Strangers as Self (uncredited)
2012
- Jack Reacher as Zec Chelovek
- The Act of Killing ... (Executive Producer)
- Dinotasia as Narrator (voice)
- On Death Row as Werner Herzog
- Strawberryfields as Turnlehrer
- Close Up as Self (archive footage)
- Dubai Winter Diary VI: Light and Reflections as Self
- The Killers: Unstaged as Self
- 10 Questions for Werner Herzog as Self
- No Mr. Werner Herzog, this isn't your Cinématon as Self
2011
- Into the Abyss as Narrator (voice)
- Hans Zimmer: The Sound of Hollywood as Self
- I, I, I José Lewgoy as Self
- On Borrowed Time as Self
- Champions: A Comic Tale as Self
- Ode to the Dawn of Man ... (Director)
2010
- My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done ... (Director)
- Cave of Forgotten Dreams as Narrator (voice)
- Anyone who dares will take the cold off their horse as Self
- Happy People: A Year in the Taiga as Narrator (voice)
- Into the Night With Harmony Korine and Gaspar Noe as Self
- The Making of Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans as Himself
- A Night Out ... (Technical Advisor)
- When Herzog Rescued Phoenix as Narrator (voice)
- I am My Films, Part 2... 30 Years Later as Self
- Werner Herzog Defends Dade as Self
- Behind the Madness: The Making of My Son, My Son as Self
2009
- Parks and Recreation as Keg Jennings
- Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans ... (Director)
- La Bohème ... (Director)
- The Lonely
- Plastic Bag as Plastic Bag (voice)
2008
- Mister Lonely as Father Umbrillo
- BLAST! as Narrator (voice)
- Capturing Reality as Self
- Counter Shot: Departure of the Filmmakers as Self
- Back to Room 666 as Self (archive footage)
- Lohengrin: Bayreuth Festival Opera ... (Stage Director)
- Bierbichler as Self
- 40 x 15: The Forty Years of the Directors' Fortnight as Self
2007
- Rescue Dawn ... (Author)
- Encounters at the End of the World as Narrator (voice)
- The Grand as The German
- Making of a True Story: Rescue Dawn as Self
- All In This Tea
- Pierre Rissient: Man of Cinema as Self
- Munich (Filmfest) Stories - 25 years of Munich Filmfest as Self
- The Devil's Muse ... (Creative Consultant)
2006
- Metalocalypse
- The Henry Rollins Show
- 50 Films to See Before You Die as Self
- Walking to Werner as Self (voice)
2005
- American Dad! as Werner Herzog (voice)
- The Colbert Report
- The Boondocks as Himself (voice)
- Grizzly Man as Self / Narrator (voice)
- The Wild Blue Yonder ... (Director)
- What Is It? ... (Thanks)
- In the Edges: The 'Grizzly Man' Session as Self
- Q & A with Jana Sevcikova and Werner Herzog as Self
- Perpetuum Mobile: Voices in the Blue Space as Self
- Dreams and Burdens as Self
2004
- Kulturplatz as Self
- The White Diamond as Narrator (voice)
- Incident at Loch Ness as Self
- Dribble as Self (voice)
- The Best of Tromadance Film Festival: Volume 3 as Self (voice) ("Dribble" short)
2003
- Wheel of Time as Narrator (voice)
2002
- Ten Minutes Older: The Trumpet ... (Director)
- The Boxing Prince as Self
- Ten Thousand Years Older ... (Director)
2001
- Invincible ... (Director)
- Pilgrimage ... (Director)
- The 100 Greatest Films as Self
2000
- Tannhäuser ... (Stage Director)
- Klaus Kinski: I'm not an actor as Self
- The Ball Is a Scumbag as Self
- The Last Documentary as Self
1999
- My Best Fiend as Self
- Julien Donkey-Boy as Father
- 2000 Years of Christianity ... (Director)
- In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin as Self
- Wings of Hope as Self
- A Brief History of Errol Morris as Self
1998
- Sternstunde Philosophie as Self
- What Dreams May Come as Face
1997
- Little Dieter Needs to Fly as Narrator (voice)
1996
1995
- Die Harald Schmidt Show as Self
- Burning Heart
- Gesualdo: Death for Five Voices as Narrator (voice)
1994
- Placido Domingo's Tales from the Opera as Self - Director
1993
- Dangerous Game as Self (archive footage) (uncredited)
- Bells from the Deep as Narrator (voice)
1992
- Lessons of Darkness as Self - Narrator (voice)
- La Donna del Lago ... (Director)
1991
- Scream of Stone as TV-Regisseur
- Film Lesson as Self
- SnowwhiteRosered as Self
- Jag Mandir: The Eccentric Private Theatre of the Maharaja of Udaipur as Narrator (voice)
1990
- Hard to Be a God as Mita / Richard
- Echoes from a Sombre Empire as Self
- Russian Adventure. Peter Fleischmann is Filming "Hard to Be a God" as Self
1989
- The Simpsons as Walter Hotenhoffer (voice)
- Under the Sun ... (Director)
- Bride of the Orient as Businger
- Wodaabe: Herdsmen of the Sun as Narrator (voice)
- The Heart and the Legs as Self
- Giovanna d'Arco ... (Director)
- To the End of the World... and Then a Little Bit Further as Self
1988
- The French as Seen by… ... (Director)
- The Gauls ... (Director)
- Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe as Self
1987
- Cobra Verde ... (Director)
- Location Africa as Self
1986
- Portrait: Werner Herzog as Self
1985
- Tokyo-Ga as Self
- Room 666 as Self
- Sonntagsgespräch as Self
- The Dark Glow of the Mountains as Self (voice)
1984
- Where the Green Ants Dream as Lawyer (uncredited)
- Ballad of the Little Soldier as Self (voice)
1983
- God's Angry Man as Narrator (voice)
- Man of Flowers as The Father
- Huie's Sermon ... (Director)
1982
- Fitzcarraldo ... (Director)
- Burden of Dreams as Self - Filmmaker
1980
- Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers as Self - Film Director: Nosferatu
1979
- Bavarian Film Awards as Self
- Nosferatu the Vampyre ... (Director)
- Okay as Self
- Woyzeck ... (Director)
- The Making of 'Nosferatu' as Self
- Scénario de 'Sauve qui peut la vie' as Self (archive footage) (uncredited)
- I Am My Films: A Portrait of Werner Herzog as Self
1978
- Ciné regards as Self
1977
- Stroszek ... (Director)
- Journey Through History as Self
- La Soufrière: Waiting for an Inevitable Catastrophe as Narrator (voice)
1976
- Heart of Glass as Glass Transporter
- No One Will Play with Me ... (Director)
- How Much Wood Would a Woodchuck Chuck as Self
- Signs of Vigorous Life: The New German Cinema as Self
1975
- Midi Première as Self
- Lost in the Garden of the World as Self
1974
- Spécial cinéma as Self
- The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser ... (Director)
- The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner as Self
- Tales of the Dumpster Kid as Hurenmörder
1972
- Aguirre, the Wrath of God ... (Director)
- Fata Morgana ... (Director)
1971
- Handicapped Future as Interviewer (voice) (uncredited)
- Even Dwarfs Started Small ... (Director)
- Land of Silence and Darkness ... (Director)
1970
- The Flying Doctors of East Africa ... (Director)
1969
- Precautions Against Fanatics ... (Director)
1968
- 60 Minutes as Self
- Signs of Life as Soldier (uncredited)
- Last Words ... (Director)
- Die Erben von Papas Kino
1967
1964
- Grimme Award as Self
1962
- Herakles ... (Director)
1951
- German Film Award as Self