NOSFERATU - a Symphony of Terror
Director: Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Screenplay: Henrik Galeen, based on Bram Stoker's Dracula Cinematography: Fritz Arno Wagner, Günther Krampf Art direction: Albin Grau Music: Hans Erdmann Cast:
Max Schreck (Count Orlok/ Nosferatu [Dracula]), Gustav von Wangenheim (Thomas Hutter [Jonathan Harker]), Greta Schroeder (Ellen, his wife [Lucy Harker]), Alexander Granach (Knock, the land agent [Renfield]), Max Nemetz (captain), John Gottowt (Professor Bulwer [Van Helsing]), Wolfgang Heinz (first mate), Georg Heinrich Schnell (ship-owner), Ruth Landshoff (Annie, his wife), Gustav Botz (Doctor Sievers), Albert Venohr (sailor), Hardy von François (doctor at the hospital), Guido Herzfeld (innkeeper), Karl Ettlinger, Heinrich WitteProduction: Prana-Film Time: Summer 1921 Location: Wismar, Lübeck, Lauenburg, Rostock, Castle Oravsky (Carpathians), Tegel-Forest Premiere: March 4, 1922, Primus Palast, Berlin Length: 1967 meters (85 minutes)
Albin Grau was the one, who had the idea for this movie. A Serbian farmer told Grau in the winter of 1916 about his father, a vampire. But the story came from Bram Stoker's novel (only the names were changed): Thomas Hutter, an assistant of the land agent Knock, is sent to the rich Count Orlok, who lives at the Carpathians. Some strange signs are an obvious supposition that something is wrong with Orlok's castle. Hutter is wandering through the desolate corridors and halls until he finds the count lying with open eyes in his coffin. Orlok sleeps the whole day long and turns into a blood-drinking vampire in the night. He agrees to buy a house in Hutter's neighborhood, after seeing a picture that shows the beautiful wife of this young man. A sailing ship takes him on a journey, which nobody of the crew survives. Many rats announce the misfortune, as the pest is carried to Wisborg by Nosferatu. Hutter knows that his wife is in danger and hurries back to his hometown, but Nosferatu ashores already. The count's arrival is a triumph for Knock, as he prepared the way for his master. Only the clear soul of Ellen, Hutter's wife, is able to stop this catastrophe. The count comes to Ellen during the night and bows himself over her body. But Nosferatu forgets about the first cock-crow, while he looks at her neck, and so he is lost.
This film, a classical tyrant-story of the German Expressionism, reflects the discouraging feeling to be exposed to unfathomable powers. That was characteristic for the chaotic post war period, just like the tendency to believe in occultism. Murnau's figure of a spider-fingered and hollow-cheeked vampire with a bald head and bat-ears became a predecessor of many Dracula- and Frankenstein-movies. There's still a fascination for the director's methods to create this special atmosphere, although the ways to frighten the spectators have changed very much through the years. Murnau used original settings for his film: Forests and roads of the Carpathians, the castle of the Orafskis from the 13th century and the granaries in Lübeck. Direction and photography achieved an amazing demonisation of this landscape. Negatives were cut into the movie to produce the impression of a white phantom-wood and stop-motion-tricks created the unnatural moves of the coach. The extreme contrast of black silhouettes in front of the light walls, threatening shadows, storm-beaten trees, chasing clouds and narrow paths, that lead to nowhere, were also used by F. W. Murnau to give this film an unique look.
Werner Herzog directed his film Nosferatu - Phantom der Macht with Klaus Kinski in the leading role as an homage to Murnau's original in 1978.
comments:
(...) There was one clear expression of convulsive beauty we reminded for several weeks, an intermediate title from the French version, which Murnau himself, as I suppose, didn't knew: Passé le pont, les fantômes vinrent à sa rencontre. (He crossed the bridge and the ghosts came across him)
Georges Sadoul
(...) When you remember the countless ideas from Nosferatu, such as the black coach, the bridge of the phantoms, snorting horses on the meadow, the softly gliding ship, that carries Nosferatu over the sea, then you start wondering, if the directors have lost their sense for visionary inventions in the meantime, and if Murnau was the only one, who knew how to make a film of that kind.
Julien Green (October 12, 1932)
The spectator has the impression to be on the same level as Murnau's creatures, almost, as if you could touch them - they seem to be able to step outside the screen. Nosferatu's terror comes from the intensity of his presence and not, as in the case of Dreyer's vampire, from a mysterious absence. (...)
Eric Rohmer (1977)
pictures:
Thomas and Ellen Hutter // the land agent Knock // Knock and Thomas Hutter // the Carpathians // the lonely Ellen // a carnivorous plant // a book about vampires // the black coach // the amazed Hutter // Count Orlock // Orlock awaits Hutter // Hutter and Orlock // the count sees Ellen's picture // the enciphered letter // the sailing ship // the first mate and Nosferatu // Nosferatu ashores // rats on the ship // a scene in Wisborg // Nosferatu at his new house // the view to the other side // the disturbed Ellen // Nosferatu's shadow on the wall // Ellen feels Nosferatu's shadow // Nosferatu bows himself over Ellen // the first cock-crow // the death of Nosferatu____________________________________
