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No fly-by-night film genre, the vampire film has demonstrated durable appeal for decades. Universal Studios in America successfully cloned its Bela Lugosi vehicle Dracula (1931) throughout the 1930's and 1940's: Daughter of Dracula (1936) was followed by Son of Dracula (1943), among others, and finally Lugosi returned as Dracula in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948). Hammer Films in Britain introduced graphic horror in color to their demythologized but ferally sexual Horror of Dracula (1958), an international box office success that spawned a popular series that continues today with its star, Christopher Lee. More recent essays in resurrecting Dracula have included a British TV drama and a Broadway play. Not yet released at the time of this writing is German director Werner Herzog's new interpretation of the silent German classic, Nosferatu. Herzog's remake should bring the whole vampire genre full circle, since the original Nosferatu, Eine Symphonie Des Grauens appears to have been the first definitive, feature-length vampire film. Produced during 1921-22, it was released in Germany on 5 March 1922, and seven years later released in the United States with the title Nosferatu the Vampire.
Nosferatu was a screen adaptation of Bram Stoker's popular novel Dracula, published in 1897. The first of many movies to be based on Stoker's novel, Nosferatu gave film credit to Stoker, but director Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau and scenarist Henrik Galeen used Stoker's property without permission. In an abortive attempt to evade the copyright law, they made several changes in the original. The setting of the story was shifted from 1897 England to 1838 Bremen, Germany. The names of the characters were changed, for example, Graf Orlok the Nosferatu in lieu of Count Dracula the Vampire ("Graf" is the German equivalent of "Count," and "Nosferatu" is Rumanian for "Undead").
Two striking, and related, revisions concern the character of Professor Van Helsing and the destruction of the vampire. In Stoker's novel, Van Helsing is Dracula's nemesis. Both characters represent authority figures by being male, having venerable titles (Professor, Count), and possessing the wisdom of maturity. In the book they Eire antagonists, each vying to dominate the situation and the lives of the other characters. Van Helsing is conspicuously absent from Nosferatu so that Graf Orlok is unopposed by any male authority...