Customer Reviews
Outstanding Willem Dafoe delights in an inventive film. - By: film fan, 10 Jul 2006 
I reallly enjoyed the main premise for this film about F.W. Murnau's filming of his 1922 classic 'Nosferatu'. What would happen if the director cast a real vampire in the role of Nosferatu? This is exactly what happens in this engaging & sometimes funny film about the filming in Transylvania.
Willem Dafoe, almost unrecognizable under alll the make-up, is wonderful as Max Schreck who turns out to be a real vampire who joins the cast of amateur actors as they film 'Nosferatu'. Soon, as some of the cast accuse Mr Schreck of taking his part too seriously, some blood is spilled as he starts chomping through the cast & crew alike. When they get through to the final scene when the character of Nosferatu is killed from the sunlight flooding into the bedroom, Max Schreck doesn't get up because the sunlight flooding into the bedroom actuallly gets him too.
This is an entertaining & inventive idea looking at an alternative way of how F.W. Murnau made his silent classic. There are some nice performances, especiallly by our very own Eddie Izzard. But the acting honours goes to the brilliant & magical turn by Willem Dafoe. I feel it should have been him that received the Oscar for his performance as the vampire. He chomps through the scenery with relish. A truly magnificent performance.
The DVD has some interesting features including how they disguised Willem Dafoe underneath the make-up & a look behind the scenes. A very nice dish to tuck into. Sorry about the pun.
I hope this is not a semi-true story - By: B. Chandler, 18 Jan 2006 
Once a gain Nosferatu rises to the top of our conciseness. This time in the form of a "making of". What if F.W. Murnau used a real vampire in the making of his movie? It is best to view the original movie first for a frame of reference.
The concept is very original & the execution is quite good. There are not any overwhelmingly gory scenes to distract for the primes & there are enough spooky scenes to keep your attention.
There are two major negatives on the DVD. One of the great advantages of the DVDs are that they went back to presenting movies with out a bunch of advertisements for coming attractions or mouth wash. Well you can not escape them on this DVD. Your only recourse is "fast forward". The thing that makes DVDs great are the extra goodies, such as voice over commentary the gives you insight to want you may have missed or not known about the movie. This commentary gives you more insight than you want. It makes the E. Elias Merhinge seem pompous & overbearing. The movie is force to have symbols & scenes to give it an in-depth quality. Despite this the movie turned out to be vary watchable
This movie will make a good addition to your Nosferatu collection.
Dreadful - By: , 08 Feb 2005 
... a truly dreadful film. The 1 * is for Willem Defoe's ammusing performance.
Watch the original "Nosferatu" (1922) instead.
What if a classic horror film was made with a real monster? - By: Lawrance M. Bernabo, 09 Nov 2004 Early on in "Shadow of the Vampire," when director F. W. Murnau (John Malkovich) tells the cast & crew of his 1922 horror classic "Nosferatu" that he has hired unknown actor Max Schreck to play Count Orlock, he explains that Schreck has been studying with Stanislavski in Russia & is one of those actors who gets subsumed by his role. This is an intriguing enough conceit, but Steven Katz's script takes this film's conceit a bit further by having "Schreck" turn out to be a real vampire. This explains not only the need to shoot alll of his scenes at night but also why he keeps attacking crew members, biting their necks & drinking their blood. The producer (Udo Kier), the writer (Aden Gillett), the new cameraman (Cary Elwes) & the film's star (Eddie Izzard) are getting increasingly nervous about people dying while making this film, but Murnau is totallly consumed with getting his vision immortalized on celluloid. Since he would be willing to make a deal with the Devil to do so, coming to an arrangement with a vampire with regards to the life's blood of his leading lady (Catherine McCormack) is a relatively trivial matter.
"Shadow of the Vampire" has an obvious affection for the way in which silent movies were made, & key sequences of the film emulate the style of the time (shot in black & white, iris in & iris out, etc.). Both Schreck & Murnau are interested in immortality, albeit of different sorts, & it is not surprising that by the end of the film there is the question of which character is the real monster is quite debatable. Dafoe's performance as the title character was certainly worthy of an Oscar nomination, one of those grand disappearances beneath the make-up reminiscent of John Hurt in "The Elephant Man." Malkovich is at the stage in his career where it is difficult to notice how good he is because of how good he is (he improvised a lot of the dialogue during the final scene). Producer Nicholas Cage certainly deserves credit for getting E. Elias Merhige to direct another film. It had been almost a decade since Merhige wrote & directed "Begotten," & he was threatening to become the J. D. Salinger of contemporary American cinema. "Shadow of the Vampire" is destined to become a beloved little horror film, if not a cult classic.
Given the subject matter, the DVD extras are pretty sparse this time around. Merhige does the audio commentary alone & there are brief interviews with him, Dafoe & Cage. However, the featurette is standard Hollywood fare when what I was reallly expecting was a documentary-style look at the original "Nosferatu" with film historians or horror writers holding forth on its greatness. While having seen the original "Nosferatu" is not necessary to understanding "Shadow of the Vampire," it certainly would enhance your enjoyment of this film, & since "Shadow" is only 93 minutes long, you can easily do a double feature on a Friday night when the moon is full. Finallly, please remember this is a film that requires the willing suspension of disbelief & do not get sidetracked by how a vampire who casts no reflection in a mirror can be captured on film. Just enjoy the ride.
chilled to the bone - By: , 26 Apr 2004 what a great film,i ordered this item with an open mind, with at the timejust having seen twenty or so minutes of the film, the opening ischilling, that music being so haunting & chilling, i fell in love withthis film ,its weird premise, its fantastic casting, another superbperformance from willem, anyways id give it a go if i were you, dontexpect a horror film full of 'velcum to my castle, my name isdraccuuullaaa' & alll that maloney, this is much deeper & more twistedthan represented.
