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• 1 2020-09-18T16:38:00-04:00 Beware! Death is coming to Wisborg 13 Close Reading 1 plain 2020-11-16T13:17:42-05:00
  
  Background: In the following excerpt from Nosferatu (00:58:00 to 1:00:58), Count Orlok stows aboard the Empusa, a schooner bound for Wisborg, hiding in a coffin stored in the ship’s cargo hold. One by one, crew members fall gravely-ill, while the spirit of Orlok looms amongst the shadows. All but the Captain and First Mate remain. As the First Mate breaks through the crates in storage, he is startled by a swarm of rats and a towering Orlok, whose physical body emerges from his coffin. Immediately, he runs above the deck and throws himself overboard. As the camera pans over to Orlok, a towering slim figure strides slowly towards the Captain, who quickly ties himself to the helm of the boat awaiting his fate.
  
  Close Reading: In the 1922 silent-film, Nosferatu, F.W. Murnau utilizes stylistic techniques to allegorize impending death brought on by an epidemic. This close reading hopes to analyze the ways in which Murnau (1) personifies Death and (2) represents the different ways in which an individual may react when confronting Death. Through implementation of dark lighting and exaggerated body language and costumes, Murnau reimagines vampires as physical embodiments of pestilence and death. As Act 3 begins, I am immediately confronted with grotesque imagery of the filthy, rat-infested cargo hold where Orlok lies. The swarming of rats around Orlok’s coffin instills an uncomfortable mood for the viewer, and immediately draws connections to disease and contagion. The symbolic power of rats is further emulated through Murnau’s use of white make-up, which visually portrays Orlok as an unnatural humanoid creature with rat-like qualities: his elongated fingers, pointy teeth, sharp face, and bald head. His white-powdered face and hands, on the other hand, starkly contrast with the dark lighting, and thus the viewer’s attention is directed solely on Orlok’s exaggerated qualities; his very presence emanates plague in much of Western European imagination. His menacing face and sharp nails act as the focal point in the still where he emerges erect from his coffin.This dark, dim lighting is also a stark contrast to the once bright, joyful lighting that surrounded the Empusa when the voyage began.
  The darkness, in this way, is used as a symbol for evil and sickness; where Orlock travels, darkness follows. As Orlok’s body is intertwined with the darkness and imbued with the symbolism of rats, he becomes a physical manifestation of evil, pestilence, and death.
  
  If we are to believe that Orlok is death personified, it would be interesting to analyze the ways in which Murnau characterizes his movement in the film as well as the ways in which other characters interact with Death. That is, to better understand how Murnau contextualizes death and contagion, I must look at how he implements exaggerated facial expressions, sound and score, camera movement, and repetitive use of camera angles; the Captain and first mate are two stylistic characters that become allegories for two different responses to death. While it is true that both of the characters die, each of their initial encounters with Orlok epitomize different confrontations with death: panic from sudden death and acceptance of a slow death. Death is unpredictable and oftentime unexpected; the First Mate epitomizes the shock that one experiences when they find out that they are at death’s door. As the camera follows the First Mate down to the cargo hold, the music and score pulls the viewer into the same dark, eerie room. The scene immediately plays dissonant sounds and transitions into a crescendo of chords that keeps building and building in loudness, setting up the blood-curdling emergence of Orlok from his coffin. The music is able to elicit, in the viewer, an adrenaline rush that parallels the panic of his character—further illustrated through his exaggerated facial expressions (widened eyes, widened mouth, etc…) in the stills that follow. The decision to run from Death—from evil, from darkness, from Orlok—by emerging from the “shadows” of the cargo hold (bottom left still) emphasizes the First Mate’s attempt to escape fate. And yet, this moment in many ways tells me his inevitable fate. The doorway (of the cargo hold) behind him is shaped like an arch resembling a coffin. Throughout the film, Murnau utilizes the repetitive framing of characters with arches to represent the passing through of liminal boundaries between life and death. In this way, Murnau hints at the idea that it was futile to run from Death because he died regardless.
  
  As for the Captain, he acts as an allegory for one’s acceptance of a slow death. Rather than attempting to run, the aghast Captain watches as Orlok strides towards him. In this moment, the viewer, is left helpless as they watch from a perspective in the cargo hold (bottom left still). By using a Dutch tilt angle and manipulating the negative space around the camera, Murnau frames Orlok in another arch, but this time, it seems that the audience is left to assume the role of the dead (laying in our casket) looking outwards toward the living (the Captain), unable to help him. This helplessness is compounded by the eerie, slow waltzing of Orlok who creeps toward the Captain as if to say Death is inescapable and will catch up to you whether you accept your fate or not. More importantly, Murnau utilizes this powerful scene to draw parallels between Orlok creeping towards the captain and his takeover of the Empusa with the darkness and pestilence that is literally inching wave-by-wave on a Death Boat towards the oblivious, bright city of Wisborg (depicted early in the film with light, bright lighting); the threat not only spreads in waves metaphorically, but on waves physically. Thus, my analysis analyzes how Murnau successfully uses Orlok as a metaphor for death and contagion, while using stylized characters and their interactions with the vampire to reflect on the very nature of death.