Nosferatu a Simphony of Horror

Nosferatu is my favourite movie. Although it could be strange to most people, a silent movie could be that great. This is a masterpiece. Silent movies are not recorded theatre with dialogs as movies are now.

Visually, this is an expressionist movie. There are different colours for day and night and an scene is pictured in negative to give it a touch from out-of-this-world experience. You can watch it when Thomas Hutter is in an stage-coach riding to Count Orlok’s Castle.

The Director is F. W. Murnau. Knowing this movie was an unauthorised version of Bram Stoker’s Dracula; the screenwriters change the names of the characters and adapted the action from England 1880 to Germany 1830. This is another thing you must pay attention, because it looks like it were filmed then. It seems to be so old that this ingenuity could be faked.


The main actor is Max Schreck (I don’t know if Shrek gets his name as a tribute to him). He characterised himself as a vampire and tried to be true to the character. In Shadow of the Vampire (with Malkovich and Dafoe) is fantasised the idea of a real vampire being filmed. In fact, Max Schreck was a talented young actor and an inspiration to future actors Lugosi and Karloff.




The movie was filmed in Slovac country in 1921 and staged a year later. Nosferatu is a fake Rumanian word that supposedly could mean something as He who comes back from the dead. The producers, Prana-Films GmbH Films was in bankruptcy after Florence Stoker, widow of Bram Stoker won in justice court against the illicit use of his husband’s rights. All copies of the movie must be destroyed. But a lot of them survived, but they are incomplete. You can watch it in YouTube.




The movie is not really a copy of Dracula. Count Orlok kills the victims who did not turn back as vampires. There is no erotic point of view, but Orlok goes to Thomas’ House to drink the blood of Ellen Hutter, the Mina of this movie. At the end, Professor Bulwer (Van Helsing) didn’t win. It is Elle who sacrifices herself, allowing that Orlok forgot the coming of the Dawn. He dies destroyed by the sun light.






There are many examples of the influence of this movie. In the seventies there were produced two new versions of it. Some parodies could be seen in several films and rock bands with this name or songs called after Nosferatu.

In comic book it was fully adapted. Please, take a look to Alberto Cerriteño’s version.






Nosferatu are a Clan from RPG Vampire the Masquerade. They are too complex and I don’t like them very much but I played with a Nosferatu Character once and enjoyed the experience.



I found this Magic the Gathering card. Magic was one of my favourite game. I quit playing a lot of years ago, but I must say that I enjoyed playing quite a lot.

Here is the trailer of the best version in DVD by Eureka.