NOSFERATU Triple Feature Review: Original, Remake, & Shadow of the Vampire

Happy Halloween! Today's trilogy of reviews will conclude the first ever CCC's Shocktober Showcase. I hope to return with new topics and reviews next October, but for now, let's go way back in time (to a time when horror movies didn't even have sound yet!) and look at one of the oldest names in horror movie history...Nosferatu...

 

NOSFERATU — Triple Feature Review

 

Blue Öyster Cult released their fifth studio album, titled Spectres, in 1977, and the first track, “Godzilla,” is one of their most well-known songs, inspired by one of the most well-known movie monsters in cinematic history. There is another song on the album that’s also inspired by a movie monster, far older than Big G. The last track, “Nosferatu,” is named after a German silent film that had come out over fifty years before Spectres. It’s a great song in its own right, and both songs reflect the tones of the respective movies they pay tribute to. “Godzilla” is heavy and dramatic but also fun and cheeky like the sequels of the 60’s and 70’s, while “Nosferatu” tells a haunting and melodic story about a supernatural malevolence.

When I was younger, I liked listening to “Godzilla” but not “Nosferatu” because one was faster and more exciting, and much like the two very different films, I enjoyed the original 1954 Godzilla (even though it was black-and-white) but did not want to watch ancient silent films. As an adult, I still prefer Godzilla (movie and song) but I have an appreciation for the haunting effect of the song “Nosferatu,” and the film is also worth looking back on, because it is genuinely surprising how well it holds up over a hundred years later. Many might not realize it now, but Nosferatu features a movie monster even more famous than Godzilla himself: a vampire more commonly known by the name of Count Dracula.

Let’s begin with the original, fully titled Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror. How appropriate, given there is only music provided by a symphony to be heard during this film, produced before the advent of “the talkies.” Nosferatu was an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula, made by German filmmaker F.W. Murnau in 1922, and when the Stoker estate found out about it, they ordered for all copies of the film to be destroyed. In the digital age it’s hard to wrap one’s head around the idea that a movie could actually be wiped off the face of the planet with the simple destruction of a stack of film reels, but luckily Nosferatu just managed to evade erasure and is now easily available thanks to it being in the public domain.

The version I watched was the restored 4K version, but there are numerous versions out there that all vary in length and quality—it depends on what frame rate it’s played at, if there are scenes missing, and with it being public domain there exists many poor quality copies. The different versions may also have different music, since the score would have originally been performed by a live orchestra as the film played. Unlike modern movies, this film could be experienced in a number of different ways—perhaps with only slight variations, or potentially significant ones. I can’t speak to all the different musical scores that have accompanied the different cuts over the decades, but the one I saw it with enhanced the experience wonderfully.

The basic premise of Dracula is followed pretty closely. A real estate agent (Thomas Hutter instead of Johnathan Harker) goes to Transylvania to stay with a new client (Count Orlok instead of Count Dracula) and discovers he’s a vampire. The Count goes by ship back to the place from which the agent came from (Germany in this one, England in the original text) and brings a reign of terror which can only be stopped by a woman (Ellen, not Mina). There are some notable changes, though, such as the absence of vampire hunter Van Helsing, but one of the biggest differences is the nature of the vampire. Orlok (played by Max Schreck) does not turn other people into vampires; he just kills them. There is emphasis placed on rats brought to town by Orlok’s ship which spread the plague. This connects to a more viral origin for vampires as seen in later tales like I Am Legend by Richard Matheson and the subsequent film adaptations, as well as Blade (1998) and Daybreakers (2009), though only the rats carry the plague; this vampire is still entirely supernatural.

Orlok is rather different from the typical depiction of Dracula. Count Dracula is suave and can pass for human and you kind of want him to like you and maybe don’t even mind a little bite on the neck, but Orlok is up front about being a monster. He is instantly super disturbing, and one of the very first movie monsters: truly creepy and iconic. The imagery of Orlok at the window was clear inspiration for Salem’s Lot (1979), and it’s no surprise, given the original novel by Stephen King was heavily inspired by Stoker's novel. Many subsequent ancient-looking vampires trace their design inspiration back to Nosferatu. I find it funny when Hutter wakes up after Orlok sucks his blood and swears that a pair of mosquitos bit his neck in a very specific spot. Later vampires had such thick canine fangs that the bite marks would never be mistaken for insect bites, but to be fair, Orlok does have those two distinct pointed teeth in the middle of his mouth sticking out over his lower lip. Any and all imagery with Orlok is haunting, but so are the shots of a Venus fly trap, the ships coming in to the harbour, and the effective use of shadows.

It’s quite intriguing when Hutter first gets to Orlok’s castle, and there are great scares when Orlok pursues him and then prepares for his voyage, stacking coffins up to be put on the ship. The actual voyage is less interesting, until Orlok becomes the new captain, and the ending builds up suspense as the vampire pursues Ellen. Orlok disappears in a puff of smoke when the dawn light hits him, and I’ll say this about it being a Dracula adaptation: even though it’s a different ending from the book, at least they showed Orlok’s demise, unlike Universal’s 1931 Dracula, which is arguably more iconic, given it was the first official adaptation made with sound and had Bela Lugosi as a far more suave count. The crew of Dracula had a print of Nosferatu which informed the production, but in many ways Nosferatu is the superior film, though the depiction of Dracula (Orlok) is too different to really compare on those terms.

The original Nosferatu is considered a true classic in the horror genre, and if you consider yourself a real horror fan, you need to consider watching it if you haven’t. Don’t let the film’s age deter you. As someone who has seen many classic horror films but only a handful of silent ones, it is easily my favourite silent movie that I’ve seen, and at points you forget you’re watching a movie without dialogue or sound effects, because the visuals are so intriguing and haunting. But, like other horror classics from the early days of cinema, a remake was sought out a few decades later that took advantage of more modern techniques, like colour, sound effects, and an original soundtrack, by one of the greatest contemporary German auteurs.

In 1979 (two years after BOC’s Spectres album) there came Nosferatu: The Vampyr. It was produced, written, and directed by Werner Herzog, who was inspired by the 1922 original, which he claimed was the greatest German film ever made. It’s worth reiterating: the original prints of Nosferatu were ordered to be destroyed, and only one copy happened to survive, so it wasn’t until over forty years after its initial release that more copies were circulated and it started getting seen again. In an odd way, since it was an unlicensed adaptation of Dracula to begin with, technically every subsequent adaptation and remake of Dracula has been a remake of Nosferatu (of which there were several in the years prior to Herzog’s), but there wasn’t a true one in name until Herzog’s version. Strangely enough, it is distinctly unlike the 1922 version in more ways than just being in colour and having sound, yet it is also incredibly faithful to the original, and pays direct visual tribute to it with many recreated shots.  

Though the vampire was named Orlok in the original movie, many of the versions released in America used the name Dracula in the dialogue intertitles, and the ’79 film reinstates not just his name but all the character names from the original story. While it adheres a little closer to the novel than ’22 Nosferatu, it still maintains the rat-plague aspect when he arrives in the town, and the plague is made even more disturbing. One of the most bone-chilling scenes is when a family sits down to have their last supper together, for they all have the plague, and hundreds of rats are crawling around on the ground and on their coffins, which are lying right behind them! But I think the scariest part happens at the very beginning, when the first few opening titles are shown over close-up footage of real, naturally mummified human bodies. It’s an effective way to build a foreboding atmosphere right out of the gate. Like the original, shadows are used to great effect throughout, but Herzog finds many original, creative shots to make his film look uniquely poignant. 

Klaus Kinski as Dracula looks very similar to Max Schreck’s Orlok, and he has a similarly haunting presence, with so much of his performance delivered just through his intense, staring eyes. He also doesn’t just kill his victims this time; Johnathan Harker is turned into a vampire and he remains to carry on the legacy of horror at the film’s chilling conclusion, after Dracula’s defeat. Dracula dies only after Van Helsing puts a stake in his heart off screen, instead of just disappearing when hit with morning sunlight like Orlok did. I have to call both of these guys out for different reasons. Van Helsing does SFA until the very end, then is arrested in a weirdly comedic scene immediately after, and Johnathan Harker is an idiot. Dracula is so instantly creepy and hostile toward him upon his arrival to Transylvania, and not only does he react with an inadequate level of repulsion, he lets the vampire get way too close to him multiple times! He should have ran out of that castle the minute he saw the creepy silhouette in the doorway.

All the changes are for the best, and the way I’d say it stays truest to the original is the dream-like quality from beginning to end, achieved with some of the same techniques as the silent version, plus many different ones. While the entrancing pace was clearly intentional, I have to be honest that it does make it feel challenging to just sit back and enjoy. It’s the kind of movie you have to be in the right mindset for, and the deliberate pace will certainly turn off many horror fans. There are numerous long, drawn out takes, and even the characters seem to move very slowly. It works to stretch out the tension at times, and almost seems comically exaggerated at others, but Werner Herzog’s Nosferatu is such a singular vision, that he made a horror classic completely independent of the original—one that could be argued as ranking among the best horror movie remakes of all-time—though for me, it doesn’t offer the same kind of ageless creepiness as the 1922 version.

Our last Nosferatu feature is Shadow of the Vampire, which is an independent film from the year 2000 that pays tribute to the original in a completely different way from the 1979 version. It is a story about director F.W. Murnau (John Malkovich) making the actual film, with faithful black-and-white recreations of scenes from Nosferatu. The movie begins with old school opening credits and even uses intertitles throughout the runtime as both a storytelling device and as a homage. This project had a surprising producer: Nicholas Cage, who originally wanted to play the part of the vampire, but the role went to Willem Dafoe (Cage would get a chance to play Dracula over twenty years later in 2023’s Renfield), and what’s fascinating about Dafoe is he’s not just playing Max Schreck (playing Orlok), but rather a fictionalized version of him who is actually a vampire. This is what makes the movie so unique: it’s not a true biopic, but rather an original film about the making of a real film with a strong element of fantasy in what is otherwise a period-accurate telling of a story based somewhat in reality.

What I find most intriguing is the main character, Murnau, is the real villain, rather than the vampire. Schreck is depicted as evil, sure, but what kind of director hires a real vampire and endangers his entire crew just to make the scariest vampire movie in history? This fictional Murnau evokes such drastic actions as taken by real directors like William Friedkin (The Exorcist) and Stanley Kubrick (The Shining) and Ruggero Deodato (Cannibal Holocaust). He pushes his cast and crew to make the film he envisions without a care for how it will affect them, and even the vampire is subservient to him. Malkovich does a great job in the role of Murnau, and another standout is Cary Elwes as the replacement cinematographer Wagner. I can’t get enough of his accent or his charisma, despite the character not coming into the story until over halfway through. All the casting is solid, but the shining light is Willem Dafoe—not just in terms of casting, but in all terms.

Dafoe, surprisingly, is the best version of Orlok from all three of these films, mainly because he is given so much screentime to develop as a more rounded (though still chilling) character. He isn’t just a monster, nor is he a normal person, he’s something in the middle. Schreck’s characterization is exemplified in a scene where he is talking to a couple crew members at night about how he became a vampire, then, in mid-conversation, he snatches a bat out of the darkness and eats it right in front of them! Though Murnau says in the movie that Schreck gets no makeup (implying he just looks like that), the actual makeup for Dafoe is a stunning blend of how Schreck looked in the original and how Klaus Kinski looked in Werner Herzog’s version. He is creepy and evil and shrew-like during the scenes in colour, and in the black-and-white recreations, he looks like a near exact Schreck duplicate. I couldn’t even tell if actual shots from Nosferatu were snuck in amid the recreations or not, they are that authentic.

Though it tries to be its own horror movie at the same time as being a movie about making a separate horror movie, it isn’t really that scary, especially if you know how Nosferatu plays out (but perhaps it would be a different experience if you didn’t). Not many of the crew members can die before the movie gets completed. It does get scary toward the very end, with the filming of Nosferatu’s conclusion paralleling the film’s actual ending and positioning Murnau as the true monster in this movie. Orlok’s/Schreck’s final moment is captured in a brilliant way, with the last shot of him in the sunlight melting away on the piece of celluloid, which satisfies his original demise from the 1922 film and circumvents this movie’s low budget by finding a suitable solution without using costly, elaborate special effects.

Shadow of the Vampire is a highly inventive film that’s equal parts horror movie remake, original horror movie, and biographical drama. It was nominated for two Academy Awards: one for makeup and one for supporting actor for Dafoe, which only adds to its unique status amid the cinematic history of what began as an unauthorized Dracula adaptation and evolved into its own historic cornerstone of vampire cinema. I recommend all three of these films, each radically different from one another, and look forward to Robert Eggers’ new upcoming adaptation. It has a lot to live up to, but with the guy who made The Witch and The Lighthouse behind the camera, there’s a good chance it will be worthy of carrying on the legacy.