Nosferatu the Vampyre is a 1979 West German "re-imagining" of Nosferatu: A Symphony
of Horror, written and directed by Werner Herzog. Its original German title is Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht ("Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night"). The film is set in 19th-century Wismar, Germany and Transylvania, and it stars Klaus Kinski as Count Dracula, Isabelle Adjani as Lucy Harker (Mina in the book), Bruno Ganz as Jonathan Harker, and French artist-writer Roland Topor as Renfield. Mina ´s friend Lucy (Martje Gortman in small role ) was now called Mina.
There is also novelization Nosferatu the Vampyre by Paul Monette.
Cast[]
- Klaus Kinski as Count Dracula
- Isabelle Adjani as Lucy Harker
- Bruno Ganz as Jonathan Harker
- Roland Topor as Renfield
- Walter Ladengast as Dr. Abraham van Helsing
- Dan van Husen as Warden
- Jan Groth as Harbormaster
- Carsten Bodinus as Schrader
- Martje Grohmann as Mina
- Ryk de Gooyer as Town Official
- Clemens Scheitz as Clerk
- Lo van Hensbergen as Harbormaster's Assistent
- John Leddy as Coachman
- Margiet van Hartingsveld as Vrouw
- Tim Beekman as Coffinbearer
- Jacques Dufilho as Captain
- Werner Herzog as Hand and Feet in Box with Rats (uncredited)
- Attila Árpa as Violinist Boy (uncredited)
Animal cruelty[]
In 2010, Dutch behavioral biologist Maarten 't Hart, hired by Herzog for his expertise of laboratory rats, revealed in the TV program Zomergasten, that after witnessing the way in which the rats were treated, he no longer wished to cooperate. Apart from travelling conditions that were so poor that the rats, imported from Hungary, had started to eat each other upon arrival in the Netherlands, Herzog insisted the plain white rats be dyed gray. In order to do so, according to 't Hart, the cages containing the rats needed to be submerged in boiling water for several seconds, causing another half of them to die. The surviving rats proceeded to lick themselves clean of the dye immediately, as Hart had predicted they would. Hart also implies sheep and horses that appear in the movie were treated very poorly, but does not specify this any further. In the TV program, he called Herzog´s behavior "immoral".