Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror (1922)

Today I wanted to watch one of the earliest, if not the first, envisioning of a vampire ever put to film. That would be Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror from 1922. Its classic and iconic images haunt horror history like something that will truly never die. Because of this fact, and how highly regarded it is, I was extremely eager to watch it. It's a silent film, but very technically advanced for its time. Even so, its time was 90 years ago! Does this ancient film live up to all the hype, or will it bore me to death? For that, you just have to peer into the darkness on the other side of the jump!


The story of Nosferatu is almost exactly that of Bram Stoker's written story Dracula. The reason why it's not called that is because the production company never got the rights to the book, and just made the film anyways and changed the names. In this version, a young man named Hutter is sent to Transylvania to meet a Count Orlok to sell him property in Hutter's hometown of Wisborg, Germany. It turns out that the Count is a "Nosferatu", the term used instead of vampire in the story. Orlok agrees to buy the property across from Hutter's own house upon seeing a picture of his wife, Ellen. Orlok leaves the next day by boat, transporting coffins filled with soil of his home, and rats carrying the plague. Once in Wisborg, the town is stricken with the plague, disguising many of Orlok's victims, as they are mistaken as additional plague victims. All the while, Orlok obsessively watches Ellen as she sleeps from the window of his new home across the street.

Hutter first meets Count Orlok

This film is traditionally in black and white, but the version I happened to get has been colourized in such a way that it is usually black and yellow/blue/pink depending on the time of day or where the scene is taking place. The "black and yellow" colour reminds me of a sepia colour scheme and at first I hardly noticed it. This is until the first night scene when everything suddenly turned blue! The pink colouring was used whenever it was dawn or dusk. I somehow think the "plain" black and white scheme would have been better, but since no liberties are taken to distinguish night scenes from day, it might be hard to tell the time of day in each scene. I'd have to find and watch a black and white version of the film to know for sure, but the last thing I want to do is watch this film again.

An example of the "black and yellow" colouring. Indoor scenes were usually coloured this way, even at night.

Yes it's true. I really didn't like the movie. I'm not sure if it was the silent nature of the film, or just the extremely slow pacing, or the "grate on your nerves" musical score, but I just couldn't stand it. I actually fell asleep towards the end of the movie and missed the whole last act, and had to back it up and rewatch what I missed. I think the biggest killer for this film are the text screens they show whenever a person reads a book or talks. It may only be a few words, but they text is on screen for about 3-4 times longer than it takes you to read it, so you're just left sitting there staring at words you've already read, and it seems like ages!

There are some storytelling issues in the film as well. For the most part it's alright at conveying what is going on. But there are a few times where I was just confused as to why I was being shown a particular scene, or who was telling the story. There are also a few text screens that seem to be journal entries by someone recounting what they have been told about the events. This mystery person isn't any of the on screen characters, and it is never revealed who they are. Other scenes appear that have no bearing on what is going on in the story, such as a professor showing his students venus flytraps and other carnivorous plants and comparing them to phantoms or ghosts and other Halloweeny things. We never come back to these, and I have no idea why they're in the film, other than another way to creep-out 1920s audiences.

The "black and blue" version of the iconic nighttime stairwell scene

One thing I was grateful for, after having watched the movie, was more context to the classic scenes I had seen so many times before. While Nosferatu is based on Bram Stoker's Dracula, the ending and some of the events are slightly different. The Hellsing character, or at least his renamed equivalent, is all but left out of the film, and the plague side to the story is new too. Also the ending is different in how the Nosferatu is defeated. In fact, it's just different enough that you could say Orlok is a different, yet related, creature to a vampire. He never makes other Nosferatu, in fact most of his victims die, unless purposefully left alive. Also, sunlight can kill him, which in Dracula, sunlight just weakens him. There are of course many variations on the powers and weaknesses of vampires in every incarnation of the creature, but I liked thinking the Nosferatu was a new variation, what with his shadow powers and whatnot.

The classic scene in which the Nosferatu is killed by the sunlight of the dawn

Other than seeing the most famous scenes in proper context, and generally seeing Count Orlok wander around, I was really, incredibly bored and disappointed by this film. Sure the effects were probably outstanding at the time, and I'm sure the close-ups of venus flytraps and spiders and rats were scary to 1920s viewers, but there was nothing here to keep me entertained unfortunately. I was even let down by the now unintentionally humorous werewolf scene, which turned out just to be a hyena wandering around for a few seconds, looking more scared than intimidating. At least now I know why the Nosferatu stuck around so long like an idiot so he could get caught in the sunlight (if you're curious about that, and don't want to watch the film yourself, just contact me somehow and I'll tell you). I really can't recommend this film as anything other than a curiosity of the past, since I found it to be such a huge let down. I was looking forward to it so much, and perhaps the fault then lays with me. If you do give it a shot, just prepare yourself for some absurd overacting, terribly long text screens, and just try to enjoy it for the weird Count Orlok character and the famous imagery.