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their unearthly leading man with schnapps and ask him “vampire questions,” prompting Schreck to confess his sadness over the bit in Bram Stoker “when the man accidentally sees Dracula setting his table.” In articulating the diminished returns of immor­ tality, Dafoe makes the moment a standout but such introspec­ tion takes a back seat to shal­ low, grandstanding scenes of bickering between Schreck and Murnau that beg the question as to which is the true blood- sucker—the pathetic wampir (in his latex bald pate, Dafoe is more Fester-esque than Orlock-ian) who feeds “the way old men pee” or the manipulative artist—a question the screenplay is disin­ clined to answer definitively. Al­ though Murnau is clearly the central character here, the screenplay seems uncertain as to its feelings about him, and even the film’s admirers are at pains to interpret the climactic wipeout that dispatches several historical figures decades shy of their ac­ tual deaths while Murnau cranks away with an empty camera. When deconstruction devolves
into reductivism, who could be blamed for preferring the naiveté of the original—which is why Murnau’s silent NOSFERATCI will beguile viewers 80 years from now while the “smarter” SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE will likely be forgotten in half the time. Shot in anamorphic wide­
screen by Lou Bogue (a gaffer on several films for Stanley Kubrick), SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE has been letterboxed on this deluxe DVD at 2.35:1. Shooting in low light (Merhige was inspired visually by the works of Rembrandt and Caravaggio) has caused a fair amount of grain to appear in dimly lit interiors and exterior night shots, but colors are deeply saturated and the con­ trasts are satisfying. The film’s soundtrack is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 (as well as DTS 5.1, for those with the requisite de­ coder) and is close captioned for the hearing impaired. (The cap­ tioning is generally right on the money, but when CJdo Kier drops the name of American movie­ maker D.W. Griffith, the surname appears as “Refice.”) There are
several supplements that ac­ company the disc, but most of these—interviews with pro­ ducer Nicolas Cage (7m 56s), star Willem Dafoe (3m 12s), and director Elias Merhige (7m 3s)—have a forced, push- ing-the-project enthusiasm that evokes the ballyhoo of a press
junket. A 5m 58s featurette is similarly breezy and a bit bela­ bored (writer Katz praises Willem Dafoe’s “incredible frightening threateningness,” producer Rich­ ard Johns remarks on the non­ existent resemblance of F. W. Murnau to John Malkovich), but supporting player Eddie Izzard (who easily steals the film) adds a refreshing note of insouciance to the mix (“No one goes, ‘Oh, let’s go and see a Gustav von Wangenheim film’”). A lm 7s slide montage shows Willem Dafoe being made up with his Count Orlock appliances, while a 2m 44s photo scrapbook shuffles through production stills and onset candids (backed by a fragment of Dan Jones’ evoca­ tive score). The film’s lm 31s theatrical trailer (presented full frame) is presented alongside a
Max Schreck (Willem Dafoe) feeds on his co-star as Murnau (John Malkovich), art director Albin Grau (Udo Kier) and cameraman Fritz Arno Wagner (Cary Elwes) look on.
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