Vampyr

Genre: horror movie (in black and white)

With: Nicolas de Gunzburg, aka Julian West (Allan Grey), Maurice Schutz (the Lord of the Manor), Rena Mandel (Gisèle), Sybille Schmitz (Léone), Jan Hieronimko (the Doctor), Henriette Gérard (Marguerite Chopin), Albert Bras (the servant)  

Director: Carl Theodor Dreyer

Screenplay: Christen Jul, Svend Rindom and Carl Theodor Dreyer (based on a book by J. Sheridan Le Fanu)

Release: 1932

Studio: Tobis Filmkunst

Rating: -

MBiS score: 8.8/10 

 

Still Creepy After All These Years* 

 

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Story-line: Allan Grey, a young man fascinated by devil worship and vampirism, stops in the village of Courtempierre and takes a room at the local inn. That evening, after hearing a strange chant and seeing a disfigured man, he goes to bed, sleeps badly and is awakened by the old Lord of the Manor who tells him ‟Quiet!... She must not die. Do you understand?”  

Pluses: fine acting all around, an efficient and eerie screenplay stoking much tension, spare dialogues complemented by a continuous stream of sinister music by Wolfgang Zeller, adept editing, artful direction, competent cinematography (by Rudolph Maté and Louis Née) and Henri Armand’s striking special effects.

Minuses: since this spellbinding movie is 90 years old, don’t expect state-of-the-art production values − for one thing, the door to Allan’s room looks like it’s made of cardboard − but such shortcomings are more than compensated by a brilliant display of imagination and strangeness. A series of mysterious events involving Allan at the one-hour mark can be explained as a dream sequence.  

Comments: for anyone not acquainted with vampires, this pioneering work by the legendary C.T. Dreyer serves as a fitting and wide-ranging introduction to their dark and nightmarish universe. In fact, VAMPYR does so much with so little − and with such potency − that I was unsure if it was a movie I was watching or some scary dream I had unwittingly stepped into. Doubtless a classic and a chilling good time for all. And just in time for Halloween...  

 

MBiS 

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*My apologies to Paul Simon, of course.

Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht

English title: Nosferatu the Vampyre 

Also known as: Nosferatu: fantôme de la nuit

Genre: horror movie

With: Klaus Kinski (Count Dracula), Isabelle Adjani (Lucy Harker), Bruno Ganz (Jonathan Harker, Lucy’s husband), Roland Topor (Renfield, Jonathan’s boss), Walter Ladengast (Dr. Van Helsing), Dan van Husen (the Warden)

Director: Werner Herzog

Screenplay: Werner Herzog (based on Bram Stoker’s novel)

Release: 1979

Studio: Werner Herzog Filmproduktion, Gaumont, Zweiten Deutschen Fernsehen

Rating: PG

MBiS score: 8.7/10 

 

The Drinks Are On Me 

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Story-line: despite his wife’s frightful premonition, a real estate agent travels to Transylvania to meet an aristocrat interested in buying property in his area of Germany. Oddly enough, the aristocrat’s name is… uh… Dracula… count Dracula.

Pluses: fine acting by an obsessed Klaus Kinski (with bald head, eyes wide open, toothy grin and visible fangs), Isabelle Adjani, Bruno Ganz and Roland Topor, a screenplay spare in dialogues but generous in spooky sights and disturbing events, Werner Herzog’s calm and unhurried direction, pretty cinematography that lingers on its subjects, judicious production values (Old World sets and costumes, ghastly sound effects, competent makeup work) and an eclectic score combining opera, spaced-out electro and choral music.

Minuses: none I can think of.

Comments: Werner Herzog may have gone against conventions in conceiving a quiet and artistically-minded vampire movie but his NOSFERATU THE VAMPYRE delivers as many chills − if not more − than typical horror fare. Although less striking than Dreyer’s VAMPYR, this adventure in terror, which borrows elements from Herzog’s AGUIRRE, THE WRATH OF GOD, is disturbing and convincing enough to satisfy any movie buff. When I heard the nefarious one say ‟There are things more horrible than death”, I didn’t doubt him and neither will you. 

 

MBiS 

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