Nosferatu may be
the first horror feature that really feels like one. Based on one of horror’s
top-three essential texts, featuring an iconic portrayal of one of the
top-three essential monsters, and brought to life with dank, Gothic atmosphere, F.W. Murnau’s Dracula
adaptation is historically significant and still very scary after nearly a
century. The film’s making is also well worth deep discussion and very
deserving of a book with a title like The
Nosferatu Story: The Seminal Horror Film, Its Predecessors, and Its Enduring
Legacy.
Unfortunately, that title ended up on book that is
disjointed and flimsy. The Nosferatu
Story feels like excerpts from essays about early German cinema sutured
together in a way more reminiscent of Mary Shelley than Bram Stoker. Author
Rolf Giesen fails to tie together his various discussions in a way that tells a
satisfying, linear story. He dwells on odd things and skims over essentials. There
are thirty pages of discussion of films such as The Golem and The Cabinet of
Dr. Caligari before Giesen gets to Nosferatu.
Then there are another thirty pages of pointless plot description, which is a
major issue in a book that is only 210 pages long (and 75 of those pages are
devoted to filmographies and appendices). Perhaps the most well known detail of
the Nosferatu story is Stoker’s widow
Florence’s accusations of copyright violations against the film and the
subsequent court decision that demanded every copy of Murnau’s film be
destroyed. Instead of unearthing interesting new details about this key part of
his story, Giesen darts through it in three brief paragraphs. He does, however,
set aside an entire paragraph of his slim book to relay every person director
Tony Watt thanks in the credits of some movie called Nosferatu vs. Father Pipecock & Sister Funk.
There are interesting chunks of The Nosferatu Story: The Seminal Horror Film, Its Predecessors, and Its
Enduring Legacy —particularly a brief but fascinating biography of star Max
Schreck, who applied his own makeup for his portrayal of the rat-like Count
Orlock and enjoyed a rich stage career, and everything pertaining to the film's occultist producer, Albin Grau— but the overall telling of that story
is much too unfocused to earn its enticing title.
