Nosferatu the Vampyre (5 Stars)

"Nosferatu the Vampyre", made in 1979, is an adaptation of the novel "Dracula" by Bram Stoker, but it follows the 1922 film "Nosferatu" so closely that it could almost be considered a remake.

The German director Werner Herzog had the greatest respect for "Nosferatu". He said it was the best film ever made in Germany. I don't know why he nevertheless decided to make a new version of it, but I can hazard a few guesses. He wanted to make a clean version as an alternative to the old fuzzy tapes. He wanted to restore the original names from the novel, because the original film had changed the names and places to avoid copyright complaints.

Herzog changed Count Orlok's name to Count Dracula. For that we can be thankful. He also changed Hutter's name to Jonathan Harker, but his other changes were confused. In "Nosferatu" Hutter's wife was called Ellen, but he changed her name to Lucy Harker in his new film. Stop! In the novel Jonathan's fiancée/wife is called Mina, and Mina's best friend is Lucy. In Werner Herzog's film Jonathan's wife is called Lucy, and her best friend is Mina. There's no justification for this swapping of names. It's a blunder.

Bram Stoker's novel was set in England, partly in London and partly in Whitby, Yorkshire. "Nosferatu" was set in a fictional town in Germany. Werner Herzog decided to set the story in the beautiful East German town Wismar. Unfortunately, he wasn't given permission to film in Wismar – the East German government was erratic in what it did and didn't allow – so he filmed the Wismar scenes in Delft, a Dutch town near to The Hague. That would have worked well if Herzog had paid more attention to the background while filming. The street signs are written in Dutch!

"Nosferatu the Vampyre" isn't the most accurate adaptation of Bram Stoker's "Dracula", and it might not be the best adaptation, but it's undoubtedly the most beautiful adaptation. The houses, the scenery, the people... everything is stunningly beautiful. When I watch a film I like to take a few screenshots to showcase a film's beauty, but in the case of this film it's hardly possible. There are so many beautiful scenes that I'd need to include a hundred screenshots to give an impression of the film.

Jonathan Harker has to walk across a waterfall to arrive at the castle in Transylvania.

His wife Lucy sits pining in a cemetery overlooking the sea.

Lucy also looks longingly out of her window while a windmill turns in the reflection. Are there windmills in Wismar? I doubt it.

Klaus Kinski puts on an awesome performance as Dracula. I consider him to be the best actor who's ever lived. I see him as a bridge between silent films and the talking film era. He has the powerful facial expressions that were typical for the great actors of silent films, but he can also talk in any way demanded by his roles. Bruno Ganz is also an excellent actor, so it's a pleasure to see the two on screen together.

The film is rounded off by the outstanding music composed and played by Florian Fricke, a frequent collaborator of Werner Herzog.

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Aguirre, the Wrath of God (5 Stars)

"I am the great traitor. There can be none greater than me. Anyone who even thinks about running away will be cut up into 198 pieces. Then I'll stamp on him until I can paint the walls with him. Whoever takes one grain of corn or one drop of water more than his ration, will be locked up for 155 years. If I, Aguirre, want the birds to drop dead from the trees, then the birds will drop dead from the trees. I am the wrath of God. The Earth that I walk on sees me and trembles. But whoever follows me will be given untold riches".

Film critic Roger Ebert said that this is the best film that's ever been made. If he'd said that to my face I wouldn't have been able to argue with him. I might have said that I enjoy this or that film more, but when it comes to quality "Aguirre" is in a class of its own.

Klaus Kinski plays the title role like he was born to play it. Only a madman can accurately portray a madman on screen. We can see through his eyes. Aguirre saw light when everything around him was darkness. In the early stages of the film we might praise him for having hope. Hope is a good thing, isn't it? But listen to his final words as he sails southwards on a small raft. He says that he'll marry his daughter, and his children will be the purest dynasty the world has ever known. He'll conquer Mexico and all of South America. As he speaks these words his daughter and all of his soldiers are lying dead around him. The only ones listening to him are monkeys.

This is a film that awes me and scares me at the same time. One of the characteristics of madness is that a mad person can't see that he's mad, only those around him can see it. But what happens when there's no one with you to judge your sanity? Then you're truly lost in your madness.

Nosferatu the Vampyre (5 Stars)

This is another example of an excellent film that I've left unwatched on my shelf for more than eight years. It's possible that I only watched it once before today. I could only vaguely remember it.

Not long ago I said that a second film based on a book is a new version, not a remake. This film proves me wrong. It's based on Bram Stoker's novel "Dracula", but it also follows Friedrich Murnau's film "Nosferatu" so closely that it can be argued whether it's based more on the book or the film.

Werner Herzog's 1979 film copies the 1922 version, but it also adds scenes from the book that were missing in the film. It also restores the names that Murnau changed to conceal the fact that he was adapting Bram Stoker's book without having been granted the rights.

Which version is better? That's a question that I can't answer. How can you compare a black and white silent movie with a modern film? It's like asking whether a motorbike is better than a bicycle. It depends on your personal preferences, and many people would like to have both. All I can say is that the new version features two outstanding actors, Klaus Kinski and Bruno Ganz. Either of them by himself would make this film worth seeing, but having them together makes the film brilliant.

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Woyzeck (4 Stars)

This film was made by Werner Herzog in 1979, starring the inimitable Klaus Kinski in the title role. It's based on a play written by Georg Büchner in 1836, and the play is based on true events that took place in Leipzig in 1821. The story itself is very simple, boringly simple, but the film is made powerful by the philosophical implications taken directly from Büchner. Many critics consider Büchner's play to be the best ever play written in German.

Franz Woyzeck is a lowly soldier on guard duty in Leipzig. He has a child with an unmarried mother, whom he loves very much. He has to sleep in the barracks, but he visits her every day. He suspects her of having an affair with another soldier, so he kills her.

That's it. Not much of a story, is it?

Woyzeck's guilt, which he never denied, should have made it a clear cut case, but there was a long trial in the 1820's, and the original transcripts of the trial have been preserved until today. The army wanted to save money, so it was thought that soldiers could make do with simpler food. Woyzeck took part in an experiment, in which he was only allowed to eat peas for three months. Both Woyzeck and other soldiers taking part in the experiments suffered from hallucinations.

This is what we see in the film. Klaus Kinski portrays episodes of madness like no other actor. In addition, he makes constant philosophical utterances at the most unsuitable times.

"Man is an abyss. Whoever looks into him becomes dizzy".

"Is No to blame for Yes, or Yes for No?"

"We have too little pain in this life, because through pain we come to God".

Those are just a few examples. Almost everything that Woyzeck says in the film is meaningful, much more than could be expected from a common soldier.

Was Woyzeck's girlfriend Marie really being unfaithful? The film doesn't make it clear. All we see is that she dances with the other man, nothing more. She feels guilty about this and prays for forgiveness. From what I've read about the play, she probably was unfaithful. It's Werner Herzog's interpretation that Woyzeck imagined much more than really happened.

"Woyzeck" is a film of epic proportions, but I feel like I'm standing outside a house looking through a window. There's a big party going on, but I can't hear what's being said, only muffled noises. I'm not able to write a suitable review.

Aguirre, the Wrath of God (5 Stars)

"I am the wrath of God. The Earth that I walk on sees me and trembles".

Film critic Roger Ebert, the man who inspired me to write this blog, said that this was the best film ever made. It's not my favourite film, but he's someone whose opinion I take seriously. I agree that it has overwhelming power in the simplicity of its story and the luscious scenery.

The characters who appear in the film are all people who actually lived in South America in the 16th Century, but it isn't a true story. It's something that might have happened. Aguirre, whose full name was Lope de Aguirre, was a man who was known for his arrogance and was given the nickname "The Madman". I would go as far as to say that this is the greatest role of Klaus Kinski's career. He was one of the world's most intense actors, with a psychotic stare that made him look mad, and this is what he expresses in "Aguirre" (to use the film's shortened name).

The film takes place from December 1560 to February 1561. After conquering the Inca empire a Spanish expedition led by Gonzalo Pizarro is marching south through mountainous terrain, searching for El Dorado. They run out of supplies, so Pizarro says that they will make camp and send a group of 40 men downstream on four rafts to hunt for food. If they don't return within a week they will be assumed lost, and the main group will return to Mexico. Pedro de Ursua is named the leader of the advance party, and Lope de Aguirre is his second in command.

On the first day one of the rafts is separated from the others, and its men are murdered by Indians. On the next day, while the remaining men are sleeping on land, the other rafts are swept away by massive flooding. Ursua says they should return by land to the main group, but Aguirre rebels against him. He shoots Ursua and all those who agree with him. He orders the men to build one large raft that will carry them all. He wants to conquer El Dorado for himself, not for the Spanish King. He writes a letter declaring El Dorado an independent country.

As the journey continues the men are killed one by one by unseen enemies shooting arrows or poison darts. This doesn't discourage Aguirre. If anything, it makes him bolder. He swears that after conquering El Dorado he'll march back and conquer Mexico from the Spanish.

The madness isn't only in Aguirre, it's also in the monk Gaspar de Carvajal who travels with him. He claims that the most important part of their mission is to bring Christianity to the primitive people of South America. Anyone who doesn't convert to Christianity is killed. While many of the soldiers only follow Aguirre out of fear, Carvajal supports him whole-heartedly.

One thing worth mentioning is the music. It was all composed by the group Popol Vuh, an electronic group from Munich formed by Florian Fricke. Part of the music comes from their album "In den Gärten Pharaos" (engl. "In Pharaoh's Gardens"), the rest was recorded for the film. Popol Vuh released an album called "Aguirre" which contains the new recordings plus a few tracks that didn't make it into the film.

This is a film that will leave nobody cold. After watching it you'll be left speechless. Is it the story or Klaus Kinski's acting? I think it's a mixture of the two. I'd like to discuss the film with someone. If you've seen "Aguirre", please leave a comment telling me what you think of it.

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For a Few Dollars More (4½ Stars)

This was Clint Eastwood's second spaghetti western directed by Sergio Leone, after "A Fistful of Dollars". In America it was marketed as the return of the man with no name. First of all, despite the identical clothing and mannerisms, Clint Eastwood seems to be playing a different character in this film. Secondly, his name was actually Manco. His name was used twice in the film, and both parts were cut out when it was shown in American cinemas. That's silly. The Blu-ray disc I have in my hand now is a restored version containing the deleted scenes, and I can verify he does have a name. He's called Manco, not Joe as in the first film.

In this film Clint Eastwood plays a bounty hunter. While hunting for a bandit called El Indio his path crosses that of another bounty hunter, Douglas Mortimer, played by Lee Van Cleef. They meet as enemies, but they make an uneasy truce with one another, splitting the reward money of $10,000. Instead of killing him straight away they decide to wait until he attempts his next bank robbery, because his whole gang will be together, meaning more reward money. As it turns out, the other 14 gang members are worth $17,000 between them. Their plan fails and they are unable to prevent El Indio's next bank robbery, but that means there's a reward of $40,000 for the return of the money, so the "few dollars more" is actually $67,000. That's a whole lot of money, even today. How much was it worth in the 19th century? The sheriff in one of the early scenes says that he needs three years to earn $2000. According to online information a sheriff today earns an average of $45,000 per year, so I calculate that the total reward money was worth about $4.5 million. Not bad for a few days work.

When the film was made in 1965 Lee Van Cleef was a highly successful actor, well known in American westerns as a villain, while Clint Eastwood was relatively unknown, so they received equal credits in the film posters. The film even opens with a scene establishing Douglas Mortimer as a character, and Manco isn't seen until 15 minutes into the film. It's interesting to see the way the two actors continued with their respective careers. For Clint Eastwood it was the second of only three spaghetti westerns, after which he returned to making films in America. This was Lee Van Cleef's first film in Italy, but it was the beginning of a new segment of his life. Over the next 20 years, almost up to his death, he made another 20 spaghetti westerns. In America he had been predominantly a villain in his westerns, but in Italian films he was usually a hero. Maybe all that he wanted was to be known as the good guy.

It's worth mentioning the appearance of Klaus Kinski in this film, despite his relatively small role as a member of El Indio's gang. He speaks very few lines, but the variations in his facial expressions from one moment to the next are fascinating. The more I see him, the more convinced I become that he's the best actor who has ever lived.

Cobra Verde (3½ Stars)

The Africans believe that the Devil is white.

Many people call Klaus Kinski the best actor who has ever lived. I don't share this opinion, but I can understand it. He's certainly the most intense actor who has ever lived. Whenever he walks into a scene his face is so powerful that it intimidates the viewer. He could be accused of over-acting, but this is because we live in an age when under-acting has become the norm. What I mean is that he was born in the wrong age. He belongs in the time of the silent movies, when actors used their facial expressions to tell the viewer what they were thinking. Klaus Kinski is probably the last true master of this art.

The film is based on a novel by Bruce Chatwin, "The Viceroy of Ouidah". It's about the rise and fall of Francisco Manoel da Silva. As a young man in Brazil he becomes the country's most feared bandit, known as Cobra Verde (the green snake). He is known for walking barefoot rather than riding a horse. When he walks into a town everyone flees. As successful as he is as a bandit, he feels the need to find a new life. When he's told that he can find God in the west, he walks east. He is hired to oversee the slaves on a large sugar plantation, but he falls into disgrace when he gets all three of the owner's daughters pregnant.

Rather than kill him, the owner arranges for Francisco to be sent on what he considers a suicide mission. He is sent to West Africa to acquire new slaves from the Kingdom of Dahomey, where the mad king has killed all the previous slave traders. Francisco fearlessly wades to the shore alone, refusing to be accompanied by soldiers, and takes an abandoned castle as his residence. He trains the local women to fight, and he overthrows the king with an army of bare-breasted warrior women. He lives in luxury until 1888, the year when Brazil abolishes slavery. Without being able to trade slaves he has no more income, and he's declared a criminal by many countries.

The film is visually beautiful, but has a depressing atmosphere throughout. The soundtrack is by Florian Fricke, who also wrote the music for other films directed by Werner Herzog.

Is the Devil white? Yes. And he looks like Klaus Kinski.

Klaus Kinski
18 October 1926 – 23 November 1991