By the time Bela Lugosi pronounced "Good Evening," in his sonorous, Hungarian voice, vampires were well-known to movie goers. The first vampire movie based on Bram Stoker's horror-filled book, Dracula, was the 1922 classic, Nosferatu.

Nosferatu was filmed in Germany, and the name of the vampire was changed to Count Orlok. Other character names were changed, and the Count did not create other vampires--instead, he brought the deadly bubonic plague to the port town, when he arrived on a rat-infested ship.

Apparently filmmaker F.W. Murnau figured that would be enough to absolve him of copyright infringement, but he was wrong. Bram Stoker's widow sued him after Nosferatu was released, and she won her case. The film was ordered destroyed, and the production company that made it (Prana-Film GmbH) declared bankruptcy.

Why then do we have this classic movie--Murnau's first big hit? Well, by the time the legal proceedings wound down and Murnau was ordered to turn over the negatives of his film to be destroyed (and he did)--so many copies of the film existed that no one could collect them all.

Nosferatu debuted in the USA in 1929.

The 1922 film has been available for years on tape and dvd--but a new 2-disc edition from Kino International is probably the best (it's shown in at right, available from Amazon). This version is digitally restored and uses the original score by Hans Erdmann--a work believed lost until very recently. It's recorded in 5.1 stereo-surround (like I know what that means!)

It includes a 52-minute documentary by Murnau scholar Luciano Berriatua, which describes how the film was made back in post-World War I Germany, and clips from some of Murnau's other works.

A review in the Los Angeles Times by Dennis Lim refers to this Nosferatu as "Less frightening than haunting," and I couldn't agree more. The imagery stays with you--though why such a creepy, ugly vampire (played by Max Schreck) should retain an erotic presence mystifies me.

Lim points out that Murnau was one of the first to shoot on location--in this case, on Germany's Baltic coast. Murnau also reflects the Expressionist art forms of the day.

Schreck, the actor who played the vampire, died of a heart attack in 1936. His name--Schreck--means terror in German, according to imdb. Schreck was so linked to his character that a 2000 movie, Shadow of the Vampire,is built on the premise that Max Schreck actually was a vampire. William Dafoe played Max Schreck in that movie and was nominated for an Oscar as Best Supporting Actor for his performance.

In 1979, Werner Herzog remade Nosferatu, wisely framing his movie more as an homage to the original that an update. Klaus Kinski stars, and he's just as creepy, with his rodent teeth, as Max Schreck was. Isabelle Adjani is suitably innocent, beautiful, and self-sacrificing as the victim/martyr.

An interesting bit of trivia: Herzog filmed both English and German versions of Nosferatu concurrently--filming in one language, then repeating the scene in the other language. That's not done often, but it reminds me that in 1933, when Bela Lugosi's Dracula was filmed, a Spanish version used the same sets and props. Spanish-speaking actors came in and performed the same lines--but at night, after Lugosi & company had gone home. Or wherever they went, those children of the night.