FILM REVIEW OF "NOSFERATU, A SYMPHONY OF TERROR (German-1922)

"Faust" director F.W. Murnau's silent 1922 classic horror film "Nosferatu, a Symphony of Horror" (****out of ****) ranks as the earliest surviving vampire epic. As many as twenty movies about vampires, some of them short films, had been produced before the release of Murnau's landmark epic. Sadly, none of these earlier vampire movies have survived the ravages of time. Ostensibly, "Golem" scenarist Henrik Galeen and Murnau appropriated Bram Stoker's celebrated Gothic horror novel "Dracula," published in 1897, as the basis for their plot, but they neglected to obtain copyright clearance from Stoker's estate. Inevitably, Stoker's widow Florence sued Murnau and company, won the case in court, and demanded that the authorities confiscate and destroy every print and negative of "Nosferatu." Happily, despite its plagiaristic origins, "Nosferatu" survived the justice of this court order, and audiences can enjoy it today. Not only does "Nosferatu" qualify as the first adaptation of "Dracula," but it also is a touchstone picture in the vampire genre because its vampire, Court Orlok, was emaciated and hideously ugly. He looked nothing like the sartorially elegant princes of seduction that either Bela Lugosi or Christopher Lee embodied. Max Schreck portrayed Court Orlok as a loathsome vampire. He sports needle type fangs in the front of his mouth, and he looks like a Nazi concentration camp inmate.  Mind you, in some prints of "Nosferatu," Court Orlok is referred to as Count Dracula.

"Nosferatu" isn't a slavish adaptation of "Dracula." Apparently, Galeen and Murnau thought they might skirt the copyright issue if they altered the setting and changed some names. Clearly, the courts saw the issue otherwise when it ruled in favor of Florence Stoker. Basically, the plot remains intact with some geographical revisions, name changes, and the marginalizing of certain characters. "Orlok doesn't set sail for England, but heads to Bremen. The Count takes six coffins for his journey rather than some forty or more. One major departure from Stoker's novel, however, involves the character of Professor Van Helsing. Usually, Van Helsing acts as Dracula's arch enemy. Galeen and Murnau have reduced his role here to providing exposition about parasitic vampire organisms. Furthermore, the Murnau film takes place in Germany in 1838 whereas the Stoker novel occurred in the 1890s in Victorian England. Interestingly, unlike Dracula, Orlok does not spawn other vampires with his bite. He kills his victims, and the plague that follows in his wake serves as a metaphor for his evil. One precedent that "Nosferatu" established was that vampires were susceptible to sunlight. Meaning, the sun could obliterate them, something that wasn't the case with Stoker's literary protagonist who would stroll around during the day, though his powers were considerably attenuated.

Meanwhile, enough similarities existed to seal the filmmakers' fate. In Bremen, Germany, a creepy real estate agent Knock dispatches Thomas Hutter (Gustav von Wangenheim), to travel the Carpathian Mountains in distant Transylvania to discuss a business deal with the Count. In Stoker's novel, the Hutter character was named Jonathan. Anyway, Thomas is a rather adolescent, happy-go-luck fellow. He dismisses the warnings of the local folk as superstitious nonsense. He discovers a book entitled "Of Vampires, Terrible Phantoms, and and the Seven Deadly Sins left in his room and casts it aside in contempt. Presumably, the local equivalent of the Gideons stash this tome in every wayfarer's room as a sort of admonition. An eerie moment occurs when the coachmen take Hutter to a bridge and leave him afoot because they refuse to cross over into the province of phantoms. Later, a sinister coach drawn by horses decked out in dark hoods arrives with a creepy looking driver. Hutter climbs aboard for a whirlwind ride to the foreboding castle where a peculiar nobleman awaits his arrival. When he meets Hutter, The Count (Max Schreck) explains that his staff has gone to bed so he must attend to his needs.  Later, The Count explains without reason that he wants to pull up stakes in and relocate in Bremen right across the street from Hutter's house.

Camparatively, the two eponymous vampires forsake their homeland and embark on a voyage to another city. Before the Count departs, he attacks Hutter and leaves him for dead. Meanwhile, the Count loads his coffins by himself onto a wagon, climbs into the topmost coffin, levitates the lid into place on it, and sets the horses in motion for the harbor. This "Dracula" is very supernaturally endowed. Moreover, not only can Count Orlok control things nearby, but he can also control things at a great distance and has acquired power over Hutter's employer Knock. Eventually, Knock goes insane, and he is put in a strait-jacket and placed in a psychiatric asylum. In the Stoker novel, the character of Knock was named Renfield.  Like Knock, Renfield referred to the vampire as his "Master."


During the voyage, both Dracula and Orlok assume command of their vessels. For the record, Orlok embarks on his seagoing passage in August of 1838. In "Nosferatu," the outbreak of the plague is associated with the rats that infest Orlok's coffins. We learn that the dirt in the Orlok's coffins is plague dirt. Everybody dies on the respective ships in both yarns. The Count arrives in the ship at Wisborg with nobody left alive, but the ship is teeming with rats carrying a plague that wrecks havoc. German officials examine the ship, peruse the captain's log, and dread the worst: plague. Before long, panic grips the public about the plague, and people start to perish. The scenes where town officials mark front doors looks almost Biblical. Meanwhile, Hutter escapes from Orlok's castle and nearby peasants nurse him back to health. By now, Orlok has killed everybody on the ship. Orlok is entranced by Hutter's wife Ellen, and he takes a dilapidated building across the street from Hutter's house. While all of this is going on, Ellen has developed a psychic connection with Nosferatu. She will exert her power, but in the process she will die as she lures the undead villain to dally in her room until the morning rays of sunlight penetrate his body and he disappears.

The problem with watching public domain copies of "Nosferatu" is that these versions lack the tints that distinguish whether a scene occurs during either the day or after dark. Consequently, when Hutter meets Orlok at his foreboding castle, they appear to be drenched in bright sunlight. The blue tints on the Kino and Image DVD versions of "Nosferatu" make it clear that this scene takes place after dark. The absence of these tinted scenes is not confined strictly to "Nosferatu," but is also a problem with many public domain prints of silent films.

Although many critics try to pigeonhole Murnau in with the German Expressionist movement, he was not entirely enamored with expressionism. For instance, Expressionists prefer to shoot inside the orderly confines of a studio, whereas Murnau took his cameras onto location to shoot some scenic footage for the film. Incredibly, some of the settings, particularly the warehouse like building facing Hutter's home is still intact. Watch closely and you will see that Schreck never blinks. "Nosferatu" qualifies as one of the greatest horror films and Schreck's performance as the "Dracula" vampire is without parallel.  Indeed, for most people, watching "Nosferatu" poses many problems, not the least of which is that it is silent and looks tacky.  The ride through the woods on the haunted coach may look bad, but Murnau was striving to generate atmosphere.  There is an interesting moment when Murnau uses a hyena as the visual equivalent of a werewolf.  After you watch it several times and grow accustomed to its 'otherness,' "Nosferatu" is really great.  Some viewers might prefer the version that David Carradine introduces and has Type O Negative performing the soundtrack. Boo!

FILM REVIEW OF ''CITY LIGHTS'' (1931)

The transition from silent films to talkies proved devastating for many movie stars. Some with thick European accents, like Teutonic actor Emil Jannings who won the first Best Acting Oscar, did not weather the conversion and returned to Germany. The silent clowns who practiced the art of pantomime became one group adversely affected by the advent of sound. Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd emerged as the first casualties of the talkies. Meanwhile, Chaplin had nothing but contempt for sound films. “Motion pictures need dialogue as much as Beethoven symphonies need lyrics,” he said. Indeed, Chaplin saw few advantages to sound, despite the sensation that the new technology created for the industry. Warner Brothers introduced sound pictures in 1927 with its quasi-talkie “The Jazz Singer,” and sound propelled Warners into the big leagues with exalted studios like MGM and Paramount. Chaplin did not rush to climb aboard the sound movie bandwagon. Instead, he hoped that “City Lights” (**** out of ****) would revive silent movies. As the popularity of sound waxed, Chaplin grew more anxious about sound. Nevertheless, he produced his greatest silent movie comedy “City Lights” in 1931. He took into account, however, the impact of sound and added a synchronized soundtrack as well as his own post-production musical score. Chaplin remained reluctant to convert to sound. When he made his next classic comedy Modern Times (1936), he made it as a silent. Eventually, Chaplin converted to sound with his classic anti-Hitler film “The Great Dictator” in 1940.

Chaplin’s survival is amazing since sound ushered in a new breed of comedian. These comics hailed from either vaudeville or the Broadway stage. As the silent comics vanished, the comedians who replaced them supplemented their slapstick with verbal wit. Although Chaplin maintained his popularity, these comedians who had polished their acts on stage for years entered the limelight as America entered the Great Depression and desperately needed wisecracking encouragement that these funnymen fed them. The Marx Brothers, Groucho, Chico, Harpo, and Zeppo, with their peculiar brand of banter that emphasized puns reflected the changes in comedy. Paramount released their films beginning with “The Cocoanuts” (1929), “Animal Crackers”
(1930), “Monkey Business” (1931), “Horse Feathers” (1932) and “Duck Soup” (1933). Chaplin faced other formidable competitors, including Universal Studios’ curmudgeonly snide W. C. Fields and RKO’s buffoonish box office champions Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey.

Chaplin’s dismissal of sound grew out of his success as a mime. The former English music hall pantomimist created his life-long comic persona--the ‘little tramp’--for the 1914 silent comedy The Kid Auto Races at Venice. Chaplin rose through the ranks at various studios until his success with the little tramp enabled him to finance his own studio. Chaplin’s mute tramp appealed to everybody everywhere because body language constituted an international language. Asian audiences appreciated Chaplin’s comic body language as much as Scandinavians. “My own pictures will always be silent,” he assured his audiences. Although he added a synchronized sound track, Chaplin ridiculed talkies in “City Lights.” In the opening scene, when dignitaries dedicate a monument to ‘Peace and Prosperity,’ Chaplin pokes fun at these pretentious people with his use of squawky sound effects.

"City Lights" qualifies as a sweetly sentimental saga about Chaplin's trademark ‘little tramp’ character in his tattered evening clothes and a hat falling hopeless in love with a beautiful but blind flower girl played by Virginia Cherrill. Meanwhile, when the Tramp isn't buying flowers from the heroine and escorting her back to where she lives with her grandmother, he strikes up an on-and-off friendship with a real millionaire. According to the credits, mustached Harry Myers of "Getting Gertie's Garter" (1927) plays an 'eccentric millionaire.' He is eccentric because he lives alone without his wife and has only his butler to care for him. Unhappy, the millionaire either tries to commit suicide or gets plastered and goes from one party to another, even hosting them at his mansion. The Tramp runs into him late one evening when the Millionaire tries to commit suicide by drowning himself. The Tramp gets soaked for saving his new found friend and the friend reciprocates and becomes the Tramp's long-lost friend—that is—until he sobers up and has no memory of their friendship.

In any case, the Tramp learns about a treatment that a foreign doctor has used to help some blind people recover their sight and he sets out to earn the money so that the blind girl can see again. The Tramp tries to earn the money the old-fashioned way by joining the ranks as a city sanitation engineer. In other words, he scoops up animal droppings and hauls them away. In one amusing scene, he tries to avoid a street strewn with animals, only to have a couple of circus elephants stomp up out of nowhere. Eventually, he gets fired for being late back to work after his lunch break. Next door, at a gym, he agrees to box for a share of the purse and his opponent agrees to share. Things take a turn for the worse, when the guy has to leave unexpectedly. It seems that the police are after him. The guy who replaces the fleeing boxer is a dour tough guy who is a little afraid of the Tramp's efforts to ingratiate himself to him. Further, the new guy refuses to share the prize money. In one of the funniest scenes ever, we see the Tramp strenuously avoid blows with the rival boxer. The Tramp keeps the referee between them at times or gets behind the other boxer. This confusion is sheer side-splitting fun. Sadly, the Tramp loses, but he keeps trying to get the girl her money.

Charlie Chaplin does a flawless job directing this sappy love story. He alternates his love story with the friendship with the rich man. The way that he meets the blind flower girl is brilliant. The Tramp is walking along when he spots a cop (cops always scare him) and he ducks into a limo parked in the street. When he comes out the door on the other side, he sets foot on the sidewalk in front of the blind girl. The Tramp falls madly in love at first sight and the limo cruises away with the girl believing that she has sold a flower to a wealthy gentleman instead of a homeless transient. There is a pretty funny dance hall number with the Tramp setting fire to a woman's chair and then her dress. However, the crowning achievement of “City Lights” is its weepy ending. The Tramp has survived a sentence in stir and he meets the blind girl again, but things are definitely changed. Like the short story about the woman in the arena in Rome, "City Lights" asks you to decide for yourself if it has a happy ending or a cynical ending.

FILM REVIEW OF ''DOWN TO THE SEA IN SHIPS" (1922)

The silent 1922 epic movie "Down to the Sea in Ships" looks more like a documentary about the whaling business and the religious practices of Quakers than a nail-biting melodrama about a young man who desperately wants to wed his childhood sweetheart. Today, director Elmer Clifton's seafaring saga is primarily remembered as "It" actress Clara Bow's theatrical film debut at age seventeen. The Whaling Film Corporation produced this vintage adventure and they lensed it on location at New Bedford, Massachusetts. Of course, by the time that "Down to the Sea in Ships" was produced, the whaling industry in America was on the decline because oil pumped out of the ground had replaced whale oil in most instances.

The authenticity of several sequences at sea is noted in the opening screen credits which praises the work of both cameramen A.G. Penrod and Paul H. Allen "who, in small boats, stood by their cameras at the risk of their lives to photograph the fighting whales." Literally, "Down to the Sea in Ships" reenacts the practices of New England whalers. Fans of "Flipper" may not enjoy the scene where the hero harpoons a dolphin, and the animal enthusiasts may regard the whale harvesting techniques are barbaric. Unfortunately, restored though the film is, it looks terrible and can be a real chore to watch for those that aren't accustomed to silent cinema. Moreover, you have to pause to read some of the lengthy title cards, some of which contain allusions to Herman Melville's "Moby Dick." However, on the whole, "Down to the Sea in Ships" proves to be a rewarding experience, more for its realistic depiction of religion and whale fishing than its melodrama.

"Down to the Sea in Ships" takes place in mid-19th century New Bedford. Thomas Allan Dexter (Raymond McKee) loves Patience Morgan (Marguerite Courtot) but her devout father, whaling ship-owner William Morgan (William Walcott), forbids her to marry any man that isn't a whaler. Early in the film we learn during a Quaker worship service that anybody that marries anyone that is not a Quaker is expelled and ostracized. A college graduate, Dexter refuses to let a little thing like not having served as sea aboard a whaling ship to prevent him from having Patience. Meanwhile, Jake Finner (Patrick Hartigan) and Samuel Siggs (Jack Baston) scheme to undermine Morgan's business. First, Siggs masquerades as a Quaker so that Morgan will hire him as an accountant, while Finner signs onto Morgan's whaling ship so that he can steal it. At the same time, Siggs sees the hand of Patience with her father's approval which is almost assured because Siggs has great references. You see, old man Morgan's son perished in a whaling accident and he wants grand children so he compels Patience against her will to betroth herself to the villainous Siggs. Siggs fears Dexter and Finner drugs the young suitor and shanghais him for the voyage. As it turns out, this works out to Dexter's advantage.

Similarly, Morgan's granddaughter Dot Morgan (Clara Bow) has a crush on Jimmie (James Thurfler), the cabin boy. Dot disguises herself as a boy and sneaks aboard the ship, only to be discovered by Jimmie after the vessel has gone to sea. Unbelievably, Dot remains hidden below deck in a cloth covered box until the evil Finner finds her. Finner kills the captain and takes over the ship, but Dexter recovers the ship from Finner and imprisons him. The whalers catch a whale and Dexter is instrumental in harpooning the beast and bringing it back. The scene where Dexter's boat capsizes after the whale attacks it is fabulous stuff, especially when the real-life shark swims into view and menaces the men as they scramble back into their boat. Eventually, the sailors exhaust the whale and return to the ship with it.

Film historians and film buffs will enjoy this glimpse of the past. The film covers the themes of man versus man, man versus society, women versus society and their confining role in society. For the record, this version of "Down to the Sea in Ships" has nothing to do with 20th Century-Fox's 1949 whaling saga starring Richard Widmark, Dean Stockwell and Lionel Barrymore.

Interestingly, director Elmer Clifton worked as an assistant director to the famed D.W. Griffith on "The Birth of a Nation" and "Intolerance." One of his more notorious films that he helmed was the 1937 cautionary movie "Assassin of Youth," also known under the title "Marihuana!"