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Vampyr
(1932) |
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Dreyer's classic vampire tale is based on a series of stories written by amongst the most influential of 'Vampire' writers, Sheriden le Fanu. The story itself follows the travels of the central character. During one of his forays he comes across an old house in the middle of a forest. Here he encounters two sisters - one of who appears to be wasting away with a strange disease. As he becomes more familiar with the environment, he begins to suspect that the house may be under the influence of a vampire. While the story revolves around this issue, the film itself uses it simply as an anchor from which the director is able to create a much wider canvas. Every shot of the film appears to have been crafted with the utmost care - every angle, the lighting, the shadows all merge together to give the film its unforgettable atmosphere. Large parts of the film - on either side of the middle of the film where the story unravels - have an almost incoherent, dream like quality to them. Shadows coming alive, there is a recurrent image of a man digging a grave, a sequence with the central character seemingly dead and yet undead are all aspects which give Vampyr its sinister, surreal quality. There is also an attempt to show the vampire as being more than just a purely evil entity. We learn much about the origins of vampires, their blood lust, the compulsion to increase their numbers, and the curse that they bear - namely that they are damned to roam the world of the undead living off the blood of their near and dear. Unlike Nosferatu, we see little of the vampire in the film and when we do, there is much less of a visual impact on the viewer. Vampyr depends much more on an atmosphere of hidden uneasiness and eeriness than the more apparent menace of Nosferatu. Dreyer's film though is nothing less than a masterpiece - hauntingly shot and richly atmospheric.
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