F.W. Murnau
Nosferatu

There are films that have always lived surrounded by an aura of legend and mystery that incessantly feeds year after year. This “Nosferatu” by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau from 1922 is no exception.
A disturbing film with many “dark areas” that, thanks to the unforgettable vampiric portrayal by the almost debutant protagonist Max Schreck and innovative and memorable directing solutions, managed to rank among the greatest “cursed” films of all time and one of the historic benchmarks of German cinematic expressionism.

The film, freely inspired by Bram Stoker's novel “Dracula” (1897), had to be released under a different title due to copyright issues, but despite everything, it had to endure a lawsuit and a trial. Losing the case, all copies of the film were destroyed except one that was miraculously saved, allowing us to reevaluate today the importance and beauty of this unique work in its genre.

The plot is well-known to most: in 1838, from his manor in the Carpathians, the fearsome Count Orlok of horrendous appearance, locked in his sarcophagus, has himself transported aboard a ship to the gates of Bremen, where the plague is spreading (the darkness, the black, the night setting as an archetype and metaphor for Evil). It will only take the sacrifice of a young woman (white, innocent, pure: Good) to overcome the fearsome vampire, surprised by the dawn's light and “distracted” by the beauty of the young maiden.
Moreover, the figure of the Vampire would be used by the fanatics of the Neo Nazi Party who would exploit it for their Anti-Semitic propaganda purposes (we are in 1922 and World War II was on the horizon!).

An incredibly timely film and considered by international critics a milestone in the genre (this would be followed by Herzog's Nosferatu with Klaus Kinski and the one set in Venice by Augusto Caminito, again with K. Kinski reprising the role of the vampire for the second time)

With theatrically styled scenes, typical of German expressionism of those years, Murnau redraws metaphysical frames set in almost unreal and scenographically neutral places, digging sequences from territories of the subconscious rather than realistic environments, images rich in extreme blacks and whites, almost “graphic” in their geometry, with innovative use of angles, editing, negative images, etc. with a whole series of metaphors and symbolism that have set new standards.
Still one of the best representations of Count Dracula ever appeared on screen. A film not easy to find but that, thanks to various online research, you can admire in its COMPLETE version here.

P.S. In 2000, director E. Elias Mehrige dedicated a film to the whole story (“Shadow of the Vampire”) starring John Malkovich and Willem Dafoe. The film speculates that Max Schreck was REALLY a vampire and not a theatrical actor (a hypothesis that has NEVER been refuted).