Vampyr
Directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer
Written by Christen Jul and Carl Theodor Dreyer from a book by Sheridan Le Fanu
1932/Germany/France
Tobis Filmkunst
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Criterion Collection
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die
Title Card: This is the tale of the strange adventures of the young Allan Gray, who immersed himself in the study of devil worship and vampires. Preoccupied with superstitions of centuries past, he became a dreamer for whom the line between the real and the supernatural became blurred. His aimless wanderings led him late one evening to a secluded inn by the river in a village called Courtempierre.
Probably Dreyer’s most inexplicable movie but one of his most beautiful.
A susceptible young man runs into vampires at a country inn. It is not all that easy to identify the vampire or the other elements of a conventional story even after multiple viewings. It is more in the nature of the protagonist’s dream. The images are the thing here. Dreyer and his cinematographer Rudolph Maté have created a film full of some of the most exquisite, spare, and evocative black and white photography ever. It is as if Dreyer thought up every symbol of death there is, made it beautiful, and put it on screen to gently creep us out. Recommended.
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