He Brings the Great Death! | NOSFERATU (1922) | Movie Reaction

[@Dej24601]

The 1979 version written and directed by Werner Herzog is a great example of a remake that is a faithful homage. One of the best aspects of it is the musical score which is haunting and evocative, and the locations set an atmosphere that is chilling. There is a strong focus on the Plague.

[@davidfox5383]

That is an excellent film.

[@wham-shirt-trimmer]

And don't forget about the movie Shadow of the Vampire.

[@henryellow]

I may consider watching them, so I'll add them to my list for now. Thanks for the suggestions 😊

[@geraldmcboingboing7401]

F.W. Murnau was an amazing director!! Great reaction!!

[@chrislaw4189]

I agree! ❤ In addition to this film, The Last Laugh (1924), Faust (1926) and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927) are some of my favourite silent films. Such a shame he died so young - could have been a great sound era director to.

[@TTM9691]

@@chrislaw4189 Agree 100% with everything you said: Sunrise IS my favorite silent fillm, Faust is way up there as well, and The Last Laugh, too. All three by Murnau. What a loss!

[@chrislaw4189]

@@TTM9691 I agree. Sunrise is also my favorite silent film, spellbinding and unforgettable.

[@henryellow]

I've got The Last Laugh and Faust on my list 👍🏻. As for Sunrise, I've watched it and it's available on my Patreon. Sunrise made me tear up at a particular scene. A good silent film 😊

[@BigGator5]

"Your wife has such a beautiful neck..." Fun Fact: The film is included on the late Roger Ebert's "Great Movies" list. Location Location Fact: After 85 years, virtually all of the exteriors are left intact in the cities of Wismar and Lübeck. Lost In Adaptation Fact: The concept in popular culture that sunlight is lethal to vampires is based on this film, which depicted such a death for the very first time in film history. F.W. Murnau knew that he would be sued for borrowing heavily from Bram Stoker's novel Dracula (1897) without permission, so he changed the ending in order that he could say that this film and Dracula (1897) were not exactly the same. However that would not pass the legal smell test. All known prints and negatives were destroyed under the terms of settlement of a lawsuit by Bram Stoker's widow. Thankfully, the film would subsequently surface through second-generation reels in other countries.

[@AceMoonshot]

Excellent as always. I was going to mention that the bit about how this film started the whole sunlight kills vampires. But I should have known you'd beat me to it lol. Well done good sir. Re: Ebert, My ex was a librarian. She knew that the moment they got a new, 'Roger Ebert's Movie Home Companion,' she has to exercise her privilege and checked it out for me. I would spend the next two weeks reading and making my list of what I wanted to watch. I loved those books. I didn't always agree with him but I relied on him to find those obscure treasures. And Nosferatu would make my great movies list for that shadow shot alone. That's how impressed I was by it.

[@BigGator5]

AceMoonshot ...Thank you for the compliment. I appreciate your understanding and story about Roger Ebert. Go with God and Be Safe from Evil. 😎 👍

[@AceMoonshot]

@@BigGator5 Btw, I have seen you comment elsewhere. And I know a true fellow cinephile when I see one. You are memorable to me lol.

[@henryellow]

Bram Stoker's Dracula was not affected by sunlight? Interesting! I agree, the shadow shot was great 👍🏻 I think it might be included in the coming Nosferatu movie of 2024. Thanks for sharing! 😊

[@BigGator5]

henryellow ...He can walk around in sunlight, but he's otherwise powerless. Dracula in the book also "recharges" while in the coffin filled with dirt, so he can't do it all the time. Go in Peace and Walk with God. 😎 👍

[@AceMoonshot]

I agree that it is not scary today. And yep, the ending was meh. But, my goodness, I love that shadow work.

[@LesWalker2023]

One of the greatest Films, much less Horror, ever made. I saw this one on a big screen years ago, and was blown away. I felt Orlok was way scarier than any regular Dracula presentation. Here we have an evil character, bent on possessing what he wants, at all costs. This is not portrayed well enough since this movie. Maybe the remake this year will try to capture it again. Long live Max Schreck! Great stuff!

[@Cbcw76]

There is a reason THIS film set the stage for 'everything else'. We'll never see "every" film between NOSERATU and, say, PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1925). I know prints of this film were making American college rounds in the early '70s, often being matched with NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD as part of Halloween festivals.

[@Cbcw76]

The 1979 version with Klaus Kinski is powerful with some well-considered updates to the lighting technology. And that film resurrected tales of Max Schrek's on-set 'lifestyle' (death-style? horror-style?), leading to Willem Dafoe's 2000 film SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE playing Max - a film about making the 1922 film. Pretty great stuff, all around.

[@henryellow]

I've recently added Shadow of a Vampire to my list. I may watch it one day. I also haven't watched Night of the Living Dead yet 🤔 Thanks for sharing your thoughts! 😊

[@Cbcw76]

@@henryellow SHADOW OF A VAMPIRE isn't exactly a 'reaction' movie but sort of a two-fold documentary. According to others, it's fairly accurate in the details of the film-making and Shreck's behavior changes. But it's also a crystalline view of what acting talent is and what it demands from someone of Willem Dafoe's 'Hollywood status' - he's a minor figure who occasionally does major parts. Sort of Harvey Keitel type. But he is PHENOMENAL. I just couldn't call him a 'cartoon actor' because of his Green Lantern "I'm a cartoon!" role. HE IS. But all those others stake his reputation as one of my favorite "portrait" actors - "Got a role? He can do it!" Still, SHADOW is recommended TO YOU for watching when you're considering other NOSFERATU films. It gave me highest interest in further research into Murnau and Schreck - I wouldn't have bothered except for Willem and that film.

[@davidfox5383]

It is the primitive effects and Max Schrek's terrifying count that makes this film so effective. I remember watching this on late night TV back in the 70s or 80s and I found this film positively nightmarish. Even back then, pretty much everyone associated with the film was dead. That alone added a veneer of creepiness to the film. The one shot where he rises from his coffin is beyond creepy. It helps to watch a film through the eyes of a 1922 audience, but I think the atmosphere and Schrek's performance in this film pretty much make that filter unnecessary. It is my favorite version of Dracula, authorized or not.

[@henryellow]

Count Orlok rising from the coffin, and the shadow scene are two of the more memorable scenes for me.

[@salzlakritz818]

The movie was directed in Wismar, a small town in the North-East of Germany. Last year, they celebrated the 100th anniversary of this movie with exhibitions and theatre performances. By the way, your pronunciation of "Ich liebe dich." was spot on. Do you speak some German? Greetings from Germany

[@henryellow]

Thanks! I may know some German words, but I don't speak it 😂

[@donkfail1]

When it's still fresh in your memory, watch Shadow of the Vampire (2000). It's an almost totally made up story of how the movie was made. John Malkovich plays FW Murnau and Willem Dafoe plays Max Schreck.

[@henryellow]

I'm not sure why, but it sounds like a comedy movie when I read your description of it 😂

[@donkfail1]

@@henryellow It sure is. Without spoiling anything; it's like a fake dramatisation of the production with a twist that makes it *very very* fake. It's funny if you have some dark humour. Defoe managing to be sad, disturbing and funny at the same time, and Malkovich portraying a demonic film maker with a the-crew-is-expandable attitude. His work is what matters! It may be a very niche movie where you have to know the movie it's all about and perhaps have an interest in movie making. As I recall, it wasn't massively popular. But I watched it on the big screen at the time and the others there seemed to enjoy it. And I've bought a copy and watched it a few times. (at lest every time I've watched Nosferatu.) But then I'm a massive fan of both the actors I've mentioned, so having them in the same movie is like an event itself.

[@mikecaetano]

I paused the shot on the page Knock was reading at the beginning and the script looked like the Wing-Dings font family on Windows, plus several alchemical spells and a couple of snake doodles with skull and cross bones. Perhaps that page is how Orlock took control of Knock. Perhaps Orlock needed Hutter alive to square away his deal to ship himself and his coffins to the city. My favorite scenes are the close up on the venus fly trap and the tall shadows at the end. Also check out Shadow of the Vampire (2000) a fictionalized account of the making of Nosferatu. Willem Dafoe plays Orlock.

[@henryellow]

Orlok used the page to take control of Knock? That's an interesting possibility. The shadow scene at the end felt creative and it was memorable 👍🏻 Yes, I've added Shadow of a Vampire to my list 😊

[@melenatorr]

Lovely reaction, Henry, thank you! Like a couple of people below, I saw this in the 1970s, on PBS, I believe, and later on VHS. Scenes like Nosferatu rising from his coffin on the ship were truly impressive to me. As for Ellen and her plan: With a little reaching, I can pull this together to sort of make sense: from the start of Hutter's visit at the castle, we see there's a sort of telepathic link between what's happening there and Ellen; we know Orlock is attracted to Ellen. That expression as he leaves the window and goes to her may indicate that, though she isn't his first innocent maiden, all these weird undercurrents should be a red flag to him that he goes toward rather than be warned off by. Most important, she's not being hunted by him, or resisting him: she's offering herself, which is, surely, a new experience for him and one that he seems to savor until, as the writing says, it's too late for him ... and her. We may also be missing footage that would have cleared up plot points and such. The last person whose reaction to this I enjoyed pointed out all the rat imagery and it made me reflect that, Orlock is associated with them. Ellen is first seen playing with a cat. So the cat has caught and killed the rat...

[@henryellow]

Your explanation does make some sense. Perhaps an innocent maiden willingly offering herself is "a first" for Orlok. At first, I thought Orlok had the ability to hypnotize his targets. Such as when he put Knock under his spell. But maybe that's a mistaken assumption. I assume the rats were a manifestation of Orlok's powers. "The cat has caught and killed the rat", that's interesting 👍🏻 Thanks for sharing! 😊

[@TTM9691]

Great thumbnail! Perfect choice for October 1!

[@robertjewell9727]

Most films concerning Bram Stoker's Dracula do a lot of variations on the tale. This one I find very atmospheric and occasionally eerie, but more expeessionistic than horrific, but even so F. W. Murnau is a great filmmaker. I have a great print of it which has the correct speed - silents were filmed at 18 frames per second while sound films were filmed at 24 frames per second and the print I have is projected at 18 which allows the images to be natural and not speeded up like a lot of silents projected with 24 fps projectors so it looks more natural with less flicker. Do you have more Dracula films on your docket? My faves are 1959's Horror of Dracula and the BBC miniseries Count Dracula from 1977 which is the closest to the excellent novel. Very fun reaction as usual Henry. ☝️Best wishes.

[@henryellow]

Yes, I suspected the movie had a low frame rate when it flickered. Most scenes were okay though, so it didn't affect my viewing. I'll add your Dracula movie suggestions to my list. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this 😊