Nosferatu - 1922 - PFF

Many years before Robert Pattinson made young girls swoon as the heartthrob vampire, Edward Cullen in “Twilight”. Back before Kiefer Sutherland showed us his fangs in “The Lost Boys” and even before Sir Christopher Lee showed us how distinguished a vampire could be, we had the first cinema vampire, Count Orlok, played by Max Schreck in the 1922 silent classic “Nosferatu - A Symphony of Horror”.

Most people do not have patience for silent films. I personally adore them. Actors back in the days of silent films had so much less to work with, yet seem to do almost a better job of conveying emotion and plot with nothing more than pantomime.

Our film, based on the Bram Stoker novel “Dracula” is the story of a young real estate broker, Hutter, and his interactions with his wife, Ellen, his boss, Knock, and the mysterious Count Orlok. Without modern CGI and other modern tools of the trade, Murnau does a beautiful job creating atmosphere and using music where speech would normally help pull the story together.

The locations where they filmed (Slovakia and Germany) are beautiful and quite fitting because they used real locations, not just scrolling sets to give you a feeling of the distance that Hutter has traveled and how far away he is from everything familiar. The use of simple but effective camera tricks like speeding up the film to give the illusion of unearthly speed when Hutter enters the carriage to go to Orlok’s castle. As well as using negatives instead of exposed film to produce an eerie supernatural effect.

When we first see the Count, most of us who have grown up with the “beautiful” vampires, will notice his striking if not shocking appearance. This is not a handsome man at all, with his gaunt frame, very long tapered fingers with dagger-like nails, large eyes, and pronounced nose, he is creepy looking, to say the least. Although with his large eyebrows, it almost gives him a comical look. Though, I have no doubt that back when this film was released he was quite frightening. The overall look of Orlok is so different from what we are used to. We have become accustomed to the fangs of the vampires being elongated incisors or i-teeth and Orloks “fangs” look more like rabbit teeth, close together, in the front of the mouth.

Less than 10 years later, we would be introduced to a handsome and charismatic Hungarian actor named Bela Lugosi who would come to shape how the world saw vampires and Count Dracula. Part of this, I believe, is because Nosferatu was an unauthorized adaptation of Stoker’s novel, so to prevent legal action (or so they thought), they changed names from Harker to Hutter and Dracula to Orlok. Not that it mattered because Stoker’s estate sued anyways and

won and it was ordered that all copies of the film be destroyed. Luckily for film fans everywhere, that did not happen and some copies survived. The film is now considered an influential masterpiece of cinema. The film is not scary by today’s standards at all. There is no sex appeal, nor is there blood, guts, or gore. But, to watch this is to realize how far the genre has come in just over 100 years. Fun fact: Some people credit Thomas Edison’s 1910, 15-minute adaptation of Frankenstein as the first horror film ever. So to look at these two classics and compare them to what can be accomplished today with all of our technology, it is pretty amazing. Not to mention, without these early films, there would be none of the great films we have today.

Let’s talk about our very talented cast. First up is the beautiful and innocent Ellen Hutter, played by the equally beautiful and talented German actress Greta Schröder. Greta was a pretty unknown actress when she got the role of the young wife of Thomas Hutter. As with most actresses and actors of her day, she was quite gifted in conveying so much emotion without saying a word. Her career continued well into the 1950s though by the 1930s her roles had pretty much become occasional appearances in films. She will, however, live forever in the hearts of horror fans everywhere as the kind and beautiful heroine of our story. Though she does not have as much screen time as her co-stars, she can steal the scenes she is in with her ability to express so much with just her eyes and body language.

Speaking of the Hutter’s, let’s talk about our young hero Thomas Hutter, played by the handsome Gustav von Wangenheim. It is no surprise when you see the talent this man had, it was in his blood. His father was an actor and had appeared in over 200 films between 1910 and 1960 under the stage name Eduard von Winterstein. Gustav was not only a talented actor but a writer and producer as well. After fleeing Nazi Germany in the ’30s and seeking refuge in the Soviet Union, he continued writing and producing films such as “Der Kampf” (The Struggle) 1936, which was an anti-Nazi protest film. Wangenheim’s role as the beloved Hutter was further immortalized when snippets of Nosferatu were shown in the music video for the wildly popular David Bowie/Queen collaboration “Under Pressure”. It is safe to say that Wangenheim will live on forever as the eager young real estate broker who comes face to face with evil.

Our last cast member to talk about is Max Schreck who played the eccentric and creepy Count Orlok. In 1921 he was hired by Prana films to star in Nosferatu, it would be the only film that Max would do for Prana, or that Prana would do at all, for that matter, the company declared itself bankrupt after the film was released to avoid paying Stoker’s widow copyright infringement costs. Max would continue to act right up until the night before his death in 1936 at the age of 56. He was remembered as being eccentric and a bit of a loner, but having a real talent for playing grotesque characters and he did not disappoint with Orlok. His name will forever be in the horror history books as the FIRST vampire ever put to film.

I have said before, this film is not scary by today’s standards but it is a fun way to start a vampire history lesson. Start with this, then Dracula (1931) with Bela Lugosi, Vampyr (1932) and just keep going up through the years with their respective vampires, A personal favorite of mine are the Hammer films with Sir Christopher Lee as The Count. At some point, you will get to the newest incarnation of Dracula, Luke Evans in the 2014 hit “Dracula Untold”.