Paganini was Kinski's passion project. A biography of an infamous violin prodigy who is generally regarded as one of the finest musicians who ever lived. Nicolo Paganini's life was full of controversy, and his performances were legendarily raw and explosive. His off-stage persona was just as mystical and wild as his performances on stage. Kinski saw himself in Paganini's story, he saw a man with an immense talent who was misunderstood and hamstrung by the community of which he found himself a part. The story parallels Kinski's own in more than one way, leading many people to consider this biopic to be almost autobiographical in its nature. Certainly, as the writer, star, and director, he had no one interfering with this becoming his ultimate statement of his persona on screen.
The film itself is a bizarre experience, nearly completely without dialogue and filmed almost completely in natural light, Kinski/Paganini almost feels like a black mass. The film opens with about 10 minutes of Paganini ferociously attacking his violin, lit only by the burning footlights of a stage, as well as ravenously attacking young girls and devouring them whole. The opening reminds one of the great Amadeus in its depiction of a musical wunderkind who is a petulant child in his off hours, however, Amadeus rights itself fairly quickly after setting up it's characters, whereas Kinski/Paganini continues down the non-narrative rabbit hole for one hundred more minutes.
This isn't to say that the film isn't worth watching, on the contrary, it is a brilliant depiction of something, but whether that "something" is a depiction of the demons ravaging Kinski's mind or Nicolo Paganini's soul on screen is debatable. We whip back and forth with mad abandon between Paganini on stage and Paganini in bed with young girls, in fields with young girls, everywhere with young girls. There is some fairly graphic sexual content in this film, no penetration, but there appears to be at least one girl who is serviced by Kinski in a way that sure as shit doesn't look faked. To say that Kinski threw himself into the role would be an understatement. Kinski felt that he was Paganini, a passionate genius who led a life that was to be envied and misunderstood, and he reveled in the role.
Sadly, Kinski/Paganini was not only Kinski's first directorial effort, it was also his last, and his last feature starring role as he passed away two years later. However, if ever an artist went out with a bang, it was Klaus Kinski. Kinski/Paganini is confirmation of everything anyone ever said about the actor and his megalomania and explosive personality, it is all up there on screen, and it is mind-blowingly self-indulgent, wild, nihilistic, and impenetrable, just like the man. A fitting tribute.
The Disc:
Mya Communication have released Kinski/Paganini for the first time on US DVD in a 2 disc special edition. The first disc features the theatrical cut of the film which runs about 83 minutes. The video is not great, but anyone who is familiar with Mya understands that their strong suit isn't A/V, it is more in the fact that they are releasing films that are ridiculously hard to find and extremely rare. The audio is equally unimpressive, however, for a film with as little dialogue as this, it is somewhat understandable. The music sounds decent, but not mind-blowing, and I wouldn't expect a lot more than this anytime soon. The image is cropped to 1.37:1, mostly likely from 1.66:1, however, there is the possibility that the image matte is opened up, I haven't seen the film theatrically, so it's hard to tell.
The second disc features Kinski's preferred cut, which runs about seventeen minutes longer than the theatrical version. There's nothing in the way of plot development, and calling the additional footage character development depends on how you view the film itself. It's more of the same, but if it's the way Kinski wanted it, I suppose it's worth preserving. The image quality on this version is significantly darker and muddier, it was apparently sourced from a tape copy from Kinski's estate, however, as a document, it will suffice. The audio quality is about as good as the theatrical cut, so no remarkable downgrade there.
This two disc set has a number of interesting extras, though none of them are subtitled, unfortunately. Disc one features roughly an hour of behind the scenes footage of Kinski at work on the film, again, with no subs. He is as you would expect him to be, and it's a wonder he lived as long as he did the way he ran himself into the ground. The first disc also features a five minute sequence of Kinski shouting at Cannes reporters, also not in English, and also without subs. Disc two features another hour of deleted scenes, most of which exist in the film in some configuration. Your reaction to these scenes will depend largely on your feeling about the film in general, as they are more of the same.
Kinski/Paganini is one of those films that has bored its way into my mind whether I wanted it to or not. When I first watched it, I was underwhelmed, but upon reflection, it really is something different, and I have to give Kinski points for that, at least. I can't say it's an enjoyable film, or a particularly great film, but it is an ambitious film, and it is all Kinski. I don't know if you can consider that a recommendation, but I'm certainly glad I've now seen it.