F.W. Murnau jump-started horror cinema and the vampire movie with this German Expressionist classic.
It’s always interesting to me to read a new review of a really old movie: most people avoid watching anything in black & white, –believe it or not, I was lucky enough to see this movie on a 3D DVD that a really great filmmaker managed to put together: that was a while back in Vampires.com history, but if you search through the archives, you can find it.
It is very much the story of Dracula, in another skin; Max Schrek’s portrayal of Count Orlok is terrific, because the man was so unattractive. Lots of rumor circulated during filming that he was actually a fairly odd man, –which is why The Shadow of the Vampire was conceived: some of the crew was rumoured to believe Shreck was a real vampire.
