Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht/The VampyreIn the twilight hours do the rats scurry across the earth and the emptiness of the night is overtaken by the quiet stillness of death. Werner Herzog's Nosferatu: The Vampyre is a poetic meditation on death, and more pointedly, on the absence of life, the dearth of vitality which has overtaken Count Dracula (Klaus Kinski), leaving him nothing but the gaping abyss in his soul, a ruinous force which slithers into the town of Wismar, a plague as foul as the Black Death carried upon his heels.
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The story of Dracula is an old one, intrinsically tied to cinema, and explored most famously in the early days of cinema by F.W. Murnau in his classic Nosferatu, which was largely altered from the source material to bypass copyright infringement charges levied by the estate of Bram Stoker. And while the rights for the story of Dracula has long since fallen into the realm of public domain, the film remains a mainstay, and an example of the best early examples of German filmmaking. Herzog's appreciation for Murnau's work set him upon the path to remake the film, adapting some elements of the plot, but largely infusing the tale with a tone of bleak tenderness which permeates the whole of the film. Nosferatu is a love story, between the enterprising and determined representative from a realtor in Wismar and his devoted and noble wife. Jonathan Harker (Bruno Ganz) is solicited by his employer, Renfield (Roland Topor) to visit the Count in Transylvania and invite him to purchase a house in the city. Jonathan's idea is that with a commission this noteworthy, he will be reimbursed well enough to justify giving his wife Lucy (Isabelle Adjani) a nicer house. But Lucy is apprehensive, filled with visions of foreboding terror, materialized by the slow-motion flight of a bat upon the night sky, a sense that even though she doesn't recognize the danger lurking in the bleak castle walls beyond the Borgo Pass, she knows what Dracula is and what he wants, and knows the danger somehow deep in her soul which awaits Jonathan in his journey deep into the ancient forest. During the daylight hours, Lucy appears normal, if occasionally melancholy; but in the night, her deep eye shadow and pale skin endow her with the qualities of a silent movie era "scream queen", her eyes wide at the terrors which seek to destroy or seduce her. There are frequent allusions to the silent movie classic, if only at the metaphorical levels; the Count of Herzog's work resembles the ratlike Count Orlok of Murnau's vision, like a recurring vision from the silent era. Jonathan is cautioned repeatedly by the gypsies and natives of Transylvania to abandon his mission, and seek not the castle of Count Dracula, for he invites doom. Jonathan fancies himself a rational man, and scoffs at the suggestion that monsters beyond the grave walk and await him there. In fact, so too does Dr. Van Helsing (Walter Ladengast) when Lucy confronts him about the existence of the nosferatu in their town. Lucy claims that faith is that which allows for you to believe in something you know not to be true, a maxim which resonates throughout the film in the wake of Dracula's supernatural and pestilent aftereffects.
While Klaus Kinski stuns as the ghoulish, rat-like undead, it is the plague which appears as an even more dire threat. Dracula travels with black coffins filled with unhallowed dirt and thousands of rats, the representation of the curse which follows him across the continent to Wismar. While Dracula carries out his work in the dark of night, his plague he brings across the seas is his silent, invisible killer during the daylight. When the town is overrun by the pestilence, the survivors are reduced to a decadent mass of hopeless fools, resigned to their fate and even welcoming the death which follows. It is interesting that the real killer of the film is the disease rather than the murderous hunts of Dracula, who--while imposing--does not carry himself as a violent man. Kinski's Dracula is more of a tortured soul who happens to possess supernatural powers. His immortality is a curse, one which has robbed him of any ability to enjoy the world, and the torture which follows is that he has been so long out of love, that when he first lays eyes upon Lucy's portrait, he is convinced that he must have her. But for Dracula, even in this there is no love, merely his compulsion to possess Lucy and fill the void in his own soul by taking Lucy as his. Herzog's visual flourish is a signature upon the film, with gorgeous vistas of the Eastern European countryside, the city of Wismar with its canals running through it, and even the desiccated husk of a castle where Dracula calls home, all paired to music both bittersweet and wistful, like Lucy and Jonathan's love, reminding us why Jonathan is willing to brave such dangers to enrich the life of his wife. Whereas most monster movies dwell on the grotesque and the monstrosity of the villain, Nosferatu emphasizes Lucy's love and her force of will. Tender moments, such as when Lucy and Jonathan walk along the beach prior to his fateful departure have as deep of a resonance as any dramatic encounter with the fanged royalty of the Carpathian mountains, and adds verisimilitude to Lucy's great sacrifice to free her husband from the dreadful power Dracula has exerted over him. But even still, Werner Herzog's films rarely end on an uplifting note, and Nosferatu boasts one of the more chilling conclusions in the vampire genre, a dread which lingers set to the music of Charles Gounod's "Sanctus", resounding a chilling revelation which echoes the death knell apparent from our mummified prologue. Indeed, "evil is on the way", and rides a pale mare.
Recommended for: Fans of vampire movies which go extra heavy on the poetic bleakness like the cold wind blowing through the graveyard, rather than the vampish eroticism or graphic blood show of other works. A calm, plaintive meditation on death and love, and for those who also favor the curiosity of a remake of an adaptation of "Dracula" by another German auteur some decades later than the original landmark Nosferatu.
While Klaus Kinski stuns as the ghoulish, rat-like undead, it is the plague which appears as an even more dire threat. Dracula travels with black coffins filled with unhallowed dirt and thousands of rats, the representation of the curse which follows him across the continent to Wismar. While Dracula carries out his work in the dark of night, his plague he brings across the seas is his silent, invisible killer during the daylight. When the town is overrun by the pestilence, the survivors are reduced to a decadent mass of hopeless fools, resigned to their fate and even welcoming the death which follows. It is interesting that the real killer of the film is the disease rather than the murderous hunts of Dracula, who--while imposing--does not carry himself as a violent man. Kinski's Dracula is more of a tortured soul who happens to possess supernatural powers. His immortality is a curse, one which has robbed him of any ability to enjoy the world, and the torture which follows is that he has been so long out of love, that when he first lays eyes upon Lucy's portrait, he is convinced that he must have her. But for Dracula, even in this there is no love, merely his compulsion to possess Lucy and fill the void in his own soul by taking Lucy as his. Herzog's visual flourish is a signature upon the film, with gorgeous vistas of the Eastern European countryside, the city of Wismar with its canals running through it, and even the desiccated husk of a castle where Dracula calls home, all paired to music both bittersweet and wistful, like Lucy and Jonathan's love, reminding us why Jonathan is willing to brave such dangers to enrich the life of his wife. Whereas most monster movies dwell on the grotesque and the monstrosity of the villain, Nosferatu emphasizes Lucy's love and her force of will. Tender moments, such as when Lucy and Jonathan walk along the beach prior to his fateful departure have as deep of a resonance as any dramatic encounter with the fanged royalty of the Carpathian mountains, and adds verisimilitude to Lucy's great sacrifice to free her husband from the dreadful power Dracula has exerted over him. But even still, Werner Herzog's films rarely end on an uplifting note, and Nosferatu boasts one of the more chilling conclusions in the vampire genre, a dread which lingers set to the music of Charles Gounod's "Sanctus", resounding a chilling revelation which echoes the death knell apparent from our mummified prologue. Indeed, "evil is on the way", and rides a pale mare.
Recommended for: Fans of vampire movies which go extra heavy on the poetic bleakness like the cold wind blowing through the graveyard, rather than the vampish eroticism or graphic blood show of other works. A calm, plaintive meditation on death and love, and for those who also favor the curiosity of a remake of an adaptation of "Dracula" by another German auteur some decades later than the original landmark Nosferatu.