With that penetrating stare out of a death’s-head skull, and his histrionic need to go over over-the-top, Kinski was made to play villains. At times, as in his films with the director Werner Herzog, he rose above bad guy — sometimes into madman. In Aguirre he’s a cruel Spanish explorer on an Amazon adventure in the 16th century. The New World whispers a siren song to Aguirre, and in trying to tame the wilds of Peru he goes searingly, splendidly bonkers. Under assault from the natives, his crew goes insane too. (“That is no arrow,” one says. “We only imagine the arrows because we fear them.”) Aguirre is left alone to lord over the monkeys — a victim of his own villainy.
