Review of Shadow of the Vampire (2000) by Max R — 15 Feb 2010

A delightful conceit that re-imagines the shooting of F.W. Murnau's 'Nosferatu' as if Max Schreck was a real-deal vampire.

A high calibre cast and heavy chamber atmospherics provide a lovely setting for the jewels in this film which are the concise poetic reflections on the hermeneutics of film making that are placed in the mouths of schreck and murnau. For example...

"Our battle, our struggle, is to create art. Our weapon is the moving picture. Because we have the moving picture, our paintings will grow and recede; our poetry will be shadows that lengthen and conceal; our light will play across living faces that laugh and agonize; and our music will linger and finally overwhelm, because it will have a context as certain as the grave. We are scientists engaged in the creation of memory... but our memory will neither blur nor fade." -Murnau-.

"Dracula hasn't had servants in 400 years and then a man comes to his ancestral home, and he must convince him that he... that he is like the man. He has to feed him, when he himself hasn't eaten food in centuries. Can he even remember how to buy bread? How to select cheese and wine? And then he remembers the rest of it. How to prepare a meal, how to make a bed. He remembers his first glory, his armies, his retainers, and what he is reduced to. The loneliest part of the book comes... when the man accidentally sees Dracula setting his table. " -Schreck-.

This is one of Malkovich's best performances, delivered at the peak of his powers, Dafoe is on form and the presence of Udo Kier as always elevates the subtexts.