Nosferatu the Vampyre

This article is about the 1979 Werner Herzog film. For the 1922 F. W. Murnau film, see Nosferatu. For other uses, see Nosferatu (disambiguation).

Nosferatu the Vampyre
Theatrical release poster
Directed byWerner Herzog
Screenplay byWerner Herzog
Based onDracula
by Bram Stoker
Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens
by F. W. Murnau
Produced by
Starring
CinematographyJörg Schmidt-Reitwein
Edited byBeate Mainka-Jellinghaus
Music byPopol Vuh
Production
companies
Distributed by20th Century Fox (Germany)[1]
Gaumont (France)
Release dates
  • 17 January 1979 (1979-01-17) (France)
  • 12 April 1979 (1979-04-12) (Wiesbaden)
Running time
107 minutes[2]
CountriesWest Germany
France
Languages
  • German
  • English
  • Romanian
Budget

Nosferatu the Vampyre (German: Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht, lit. 'Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night') is a 1979 German New Wave period gothic horror film written and directed by Werner Herzog. It is set primarily in 19th-century Wismar, Germany and Transylvania, and was conceived as a stylistic adaptation of Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula, taking the title, setting and titular character's design from F. W. Murnau's 1922 film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror. The picture stars Klaus Kinski as Count Dracula, Isabelle Adjani as Lucy Harker, Bruno Ganz as Jonathan Harker, and French artist-writer Roland Topor as Renfield. There are two different versions of the film, one in which the actors speak English, and one in which they speak German.[3]

Herzog's production of Nosferatu was very well received by critics and enjoyed a comfortable degree of commercial success.[4] The film also marks the second of five collaborations between director Herzog and actor Kinski,[5] immediately followed by 1979's Woyzeck. The film had 1,000,000 admissions in West Germany and grossed ITL 53,870,000 in Italy.[6] It was also a modest success in Adjani's home country, taking in 933,533 admissions in France.[7]

A novelization of the screenplay was written by Paul Monette and published by both Avon Publishing and Picador in 1979. The 1988 Italian horror film Nosferatu in Venice is a "sequel-in-name-only",[8] again featuring Kinski in the title role.[9]

  1. ^ "Nosferatu - Phantom der Nacht". filmportal.de. Retrieved 22 June 2021.
  2. ^ "NOSFERATU THE VAMPIRE (AA)". British Board of Film Classification. 9 January 1979. Retrieved 23 November 2012.
  3. ^ "Nosferatu, the Vampyre | film by Herzog [1979] | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 20 December 2022.
  4. ^ "An Adaptation With Fangs by Garrett Chaffin-Quiray". Kinoeye. Retrieved 30 January 2007.
  5. ^ "Frames 'n' friends by Amulya Nagaraj". The Hindu. Archived from the original on 16 October 2007. Retrieved 30 January 2007.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  6. ^ "Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) - Box office / business" – via www.imdb.com.
  7. ^ JP. "Nosferatu Phantom der Nacht (1979)- JPBox-Office". www.jpbox-office.com.
  8. ^ Reeves, Tony. "Vampire In Venice (Nosferatu A Venezia) — 1986". Archived from the original on 22 March 2017. Retrieved 6 February 2018.
  9. ^ "Nosferatu in Venice (Prince of the Night) DVD Review: When Art Becomes Trash - Cinema Sentries". cinemasentries.com. Archived from the original on 25 February 2017. Retrieved 6 February 2018.