Cobra Verde

It's 1987, Herzog and Kinski take their show, their last one together, to Africa.
This isn't the best of Herzog, but it is still leaps above others on visual implentation and on pure entertainment. At times Herzog seems almost bored to be able to play with the image as he does; every shot of the montage, as he effortlessly tells the story, is a beautifully balanced, harmonised, and lit (in his distinctive sweaty tones, red more here) moving tableau. Indeed as Herzog gets older he seems to have discovered a slightly more baroque eye, he is also keener to use tricks with lens and magnification.
Herzog does tell the story, in a slightly reticent manner. Cobra Verde has a lot of appearing half-way through a scene, Kinski is again completely out of his mind but looks old and rather sad. He is often quiet. He is an acting genius. The story trundles along, we get our wonderful Herzog side characters. We get our casual brutality (all riffs on that great moment in 'Aguirre' where Kinski, in the corner of shot, chucks the dead body back in the water) and our fantastically sketched and briefly seen side characters of insane wierdos.
The story is also another Herzog tale of cultural dissonance, a complete lack of understanding, the brutal obscenity and lack of any human categories in the natural gaze. The Africans are nicely shot by Herzog (he shoots them as this lumped together 'outside' because he admits to no way in for the westener to understand) as completely and utterly alien, but even there comical routines have a terrible and terrifying dignity.
This is a film where the slave trade is shown in its full evil, despite not a single debate about it and our central character (not really identified with, we have wide shots and much less face work than earlier Herzog) being an unrepetentant and unthinking trader. The final scene, by the way, is another fantastic image, as always.
Herzog wasn't at his very very best, this is a little ponderous, but overall he remains the master.