Movie – Nosferatu, Eine
sympphonie der Grauens
Score : 7/10
Year :
1922 (and later in other countries)
Country:
Germany
Language:
Silent.
Duration:
multiple*
One of
many adaptation of Stoker's Dracula, Nosferatu was an unauthorized one, where
Henrik Galeen was told to alter many details from the novel.
He dropped some characters, renaming all the other remaining ones- modifying relationships,
changing geographical location of the movie from England to Germany, and
setting in 1830's instead of 1890's.
In this process, I find the original allegories have been greatly diminished, as well as the feminist issues pertaining to the female character's of the novel, and the social commentaries made through them.
The
ending and the plot to get to it have also been altered and despite of all
these, Florence Balcombe, Stocker's widow, sued the company who made the film
and we almost wouldn't have ever seen it, as all copies were ordered to be
destroyed - starting by the original negatives.
Luckily,
some copies had been kept secret, leaked into theaters and eventually Balcombe
gave up her attempts to legally block public viewings, and thus years after her
death, copies resurfaced to be viewed once again. It fell into public domain,
and some of the copies re-instated the novel's original character names - but
very logically couldn't also incorporate the original geographical or temporal
settings of the novel, nor it's main plot and ending.
With the
destroyed negatives, Hans Erdmann's original symphonic score was lost and
many different musical scores replaced at various versions the
re-released Nosferatu.
Despite
deviations from the novel, this German expressionistic film
retained many elements of the original story, and became a cult-classic horror
movie, for good reasons. Indeed, with interesting atmosphere created by the
lighting and cinematography, Nosferatu engages and entertains, and the
casting's expressions that are so inherent to the silent movie area create a
very humorous effect and a certain charm - that I found enhanced in the
B&W, 24FPS version that we watched today, and which lasted 1 hour.
Galeshka Moravioff's musical score is eerie and perfectly suits Nosferatu's
ambiance, both in suspenseful and more dramatic moments.
I enjoyed this artistically made movie, where practical effects are visible but fun, despite their flaws. It's really funny to see the count receiving Hutter/Harker telling him it's midnight, in full light... When you watch, remember it was filmed in 1921, on an extremely low budget (with only 1 camera....) !
Nosferatu is my first-ever vampire movie, I believe, but not the first horror as I've seen a few others. It's totally entertaining, even if you're not into the topic of vampires. It's definitely a mile-stone in Dracla adaptations and earns the fascination it has held for many years.
I'm not very familailar with 1830's fashion, but found the costuming rather beautiful, especially for Ellen Hutter (Mina Harker)'s dress, and more generally for the other characters as well.
Stay tuned with a few tiny notes on some cast members, and on the DVD further down.
The Cast (with equivalences to the Novel)
Max Schreck as Count Orlok (AKA Nosferatu = Count Dracula) -> His make-up, posture and gait are assets, perfect looking Dracula.
Gustav von Wangenheim as Thomas Hutter (Jonathan Harker)
Greta Schröder as Ellen Hutter (= Mina Harker) -> the scene where she's desperately shocked from the book she's holding, supposing that she has already read a bit but then, we see the title, is just hilarious!
Alexander Granach as Knock (=Renfield) -> his general crazy demeanor goes well with thus lunatic patient from the novel, and even retains a tiny bit of his zoophageous nature, in a very tame fashion that I found well hinted.
Georg H. Schnell as Shipowner Harding (=Arthur Holmwood)
Ruth Landshoff as Annie (Lucy Westenra)
John Gottowt as Professor Bulwer (Abraham Van Helsing)
Gustav Botz as Professor Sievers (John Seward)
Max Nemetz as The Captain of The Empusa
Wolfgang Heinz as First Mate of The Empusa
Hardy von Francois as mental hospital doctor
Albert Venohr as sailor two
Guido Herzfeld as innkeeper
Karl Etlinger as student with Bulwer
Fanny Schreck as hospital nurse
The many variations of Nosferatu's duration :
1h34
1h21 (USA)
1h25 (Belgium)
1h05 (Spain -VHS)
1h32 (Spain -DVD)
1h24 (at 20 FPS)
1h28 (1997 UK restored)
1h24 (Sweden -DVD)
Nosferatu... in the media
We own French DVD (ASIN B0017IYW51, converted to EAN 3760019380032 - contrary to the erroneous bar-code 5060046672260 which is shared by Satyajit Ray's Jalsaghar that we also own and would review eventually).
The movie's in full-screen, original 1.33:1 ratio.
1h00 (France, 24 fps, b&w version) - with French inter-titles.
1h30 (France, 1ed version) - German inter-tiltes, with optional French or English subtitles.
The movie is divide to 5 acts, and this zone 2 limited dvd bonus are only text with historical facts and Murnau's filmography, which can be found more easily on my IMDb link at the start of this review.
Sound quality's adequate, and lets Moravioff's score in stereo flow naturally. The image quality is limited to what a DVD released in 1999 can offer.
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