History YMMV / Nosferatu

* EsotericHappyEnding: A rare {{inversion}}. Many people have found the game's bad ending, in which [[spoiler:Kyle defeats the vampire but gets bitten by the already turned Erin]], to be pretty good for the main characters. [[spoiler:They gain immortality and eternal youth, get to spend the rest of their days together and presumably acquire the vampire's castle and assets now that he's dead. Pretty much the only bad thing about this is that the sunlight is now dangerous for them.]]

** In order to make the carriage seem "supernaturally fast", they just {{undercrank}}ed the camera. In 1922 this certainly ''looked'' spooky, but today? [[http://bennyhillifier.com/?id=BoBu2C5PS8w Brings Benny Hill to mind]].

* SpecialEffectFailure: When Count Orlok rises out of his coffin in the hull of the ship, there's a porthole right next to him and you can see bright daylight on the other side, which is fatal to him as we later learn.

** Whether or not this was intentional is a matter of genuine scholarly debate; while there are hints at a lot of the uglier stereotypes of the time, most accounts suggest that F. W. Murnau himself didn't hold any real anti-Semitic views.

* AssPull: One of the most famous in movie history; Creator/FWMurnau couldn't figure out how to kill Orlok, so he finally just said "Uh, sunlight? Yeah, that works..." [[LostInImitation Since then, almost every vampire in fiction]] has been [[WeakenedByTheLight vulnerable to it]]. Incidentally, the effect can also utterly fail if you see the silent film in a version without the tints, since in plain black-and-white, the orthochromatic film stock doesn't distinguish between day and night, and the tints (dark blue for night, amber for day) do the job better to distinguish both.

* OffendingTheCreatorsOwn: It's been [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosferatu#Themes frequently suggested]] by analysts that the film carries anti-Semitic undertones, given, among other things, Orlok's long-nosed design, his status as a foreign invader in a quiet German town, and him being analogized with rats and vermin. However, the film's screenwriter, Henrick Galeen, was Jewish, as were several members of the cast. It's also worth noting that the Nazis themselves ''hated'' this movie, and it appears on their famous list of "degenerate art".

* EsotericHappyEnding: A rare {{inversion}}. Many people have found the game's bad ending, in which [[spoiler:Kyle defeats the vampire but gets bitten by the already turned Erin]], to be pretty good for the main characters. [[spoiler:They gain immortality and eternal youth, get to spend the rest of their days together and presumably acquire the vampire's castle and assets now that he's dead.]]

* IAmNotShazam: "Nosferatu" is not actually Orlok's name. In fact [[AsLongAsItSoundsForeign we don't even know what "nosferatu" actually means]] other than a garbled way to say "plaguebearer." Stoker borrowed the name from some English researcher in Romanian folklore and it's a garbled pseudo-Romanian word that appears in ''Literature/{{Dracula}}'', which Murnau selected as the title for his movie. Not helping is that his memorable appearance in ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePant'', [[ParodyDisplacement which is where most younger audiences know him from]], does call him "Nosferatu".

* IAmNotShazam: "Nosferatu" is not actually Orlok's name. In fact [[AsLongAsItSoundsForeign we don't even know what "nosferatu" actually means]] other than a garbled way to say "plaguebearer." Stoker borrowed the name from some English researcher in Romanian folklore and it's a garbled pseudo-Romanian word that appears in ''Literature/{{Dracula}}'', which Murnau selected as the title for his movie.

* UnfortunateImplications: It's been [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosferatu#Themes frequently suggested]] by analysts that the film carries anti-Semitic undertones, given, among other things, Orlok's long-nosed design, his status as a foreign invader in a quiet German town, and him being analogized with rats and vermin. Whether or not this was intentional is a matter of genuine scholarly debate; while there are hints at a lot of the uglier stereotypes of the time, most accounts suggest that F. W. Murnau himself didn't hold any real anti-Semitic views, and the film's screenwriter, Henrick Galeen, was Jewish, as were several members of the cast. It's also worth noting that the Nazis themselves ''hated'' this movie, and it appears on their famous list of "degenerate art".

* UncannyValley: While Orlok is naturally supposed to be disturbing, Hutter's ChewingTheScenery overacting and big grins make him come off as channeling the Joker, while Ellen seems to have been zombified even before the movie starts. Naturally, this works all the better for a horror movie.

* UnfortunateImplications: It's been [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosferatu#Themes frequently suggested]] by analysts that the film carries anti-Semitic undertones, given, among other things, Orlok's long-nosed design, his status as a foreign invader in a quiet German town, and him being analogized with rats and vermin. Whether or not this was intentional is a matter of genuine scholarly debate; while there are hints at a lot of the uglier stereotypes of the time, most accounts suggest that F. W. Murnau himself didn't hold any real anti-Semitic views, and the film's screenwriter, Henrick Galeen, was Jewish.

** Max Schreck was a prolific stage and screen actor; ''Nosferatu'' was far from his only role, though it was only his third movie and is certainly his most well-known today. This myth remains strangely persistent even in the Internet era, due to a variety of conflicting information dating back to the film's initial release. The German press spread a rumor that Schreck was actually a pseudonym for Alfred Abel, who had previously worked with Creator/FWMurnau on ''Phantom'' and later starred in ''Film/{{Metropolis}}'', a claim repeated in some books into the 1980s;[[note]]this despite Schreck costarring with Abel in Murnau's ''The Grand Duke's Finances''[[/note]] other sources went further, claiming that Orlok was an unknown actor using Schreck's name. Greek film historian Adonis Kyru [[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-books-dracula-schreck/book-lifts-lid-on-star-of-eerie-first-dracula-film-idUSL0983779720080509 joked]] in an essay on the movie that Schreck's performance was so convincing that Murnau must have cast a ''real'' vampire as Orlok, an idea which later inspired the film ''Film/ShadowOfTheVampire''. Schreck's reputation an eccentric loner who rarely granted interviews or socialized with collaborators did nothing to dispel the rumors, even though he did take part in several promotional events during the film's release.

* MoralEventHorizon: Orlok letting his plague-bearing rats roam through Wisborg and cause hundreds of innocents to be infected with certainly deadly results just to detach attention from his vampire attacks.

!!The original

!!The remake
* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic:
** In the case of Creator/WernerHerzog's ''Nosferatu the Vampyre'', there's another collaboration and brilliant soundtrack by UsefulNotes/{{German|y}} group Music/PopolVuh.
** As well as Music/RichardWagner's Rheingold, used when darkness falls during Harker's walk to the castle, culminating in him (and the audience) seeing the vampire for the first time.
* {{Narm}}: [[CultureClash In Mexico]] the intro scene with the mummies was rendered completely ineffective as most viewers in the country recognized they are the famous ''Momias de Guanajuato''. Yes, the same ones Wrestling/ElSanto fought that one time.

* AssPull: One of the most famous in movie history; Creator/FWMurnau couldn't figure out how to kill Orlock, so he finally just said "Uh, sunlight? Yeah, that works..." [[LostInImitation Since then, almost every vampire in fiction]] has been [[WeakenedByTheLight vulnerable to it]]. Incidentally, the effect can also utterly fail if you see the silent film in a version without the tints, since in plain black-and-white, the orthochromatic film stock doesn't distinguish between day and night, and the tints (dark blue for night, amber for day) do the job better to distinguish both.

----

* MoralEventHorizon: Orlok letting his plague-bearing rats roam through Wisborg and cause hundreds of innocents to be infected with certainly deadly results just to detatch attention from his vampire attacks.

* SignatureScene: The plague ship massacre especially the final part where Orlock comes on deck and stands in an empty ship all alone after killing all the crew.

** The awakening and rising of Count Orlock from his casket, which has constantly been stated as one of the greatest and most terrifying moments in cinematic horror.
* UncannyValley: While Orlock is naturally supposed to be disturbing, Hutter's ChewingTheScenery overacting and big grins make him come off as channeling the Joker, while Ellen seems to have been zombified even before the movie starts. Naturally, this works all the better for a horror movie.
* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: Max Schreck looks absolutely ''phenomenal'' in his Count Orlok attire, genuinely looking like a hideous monster of the night. Especially impressive for the time it was produced. Part of the reason it worked is because of the greater realism. It's often neglected that this poster-child of GermanExpressionism made extensive use of location shooting.

** Max Schreck was a prolific stage and screen actor; ''Nosferatu'' was far from his only role, though it was only his third movie and is certainly his most well-known today. This myth remains strangely persistent even in the Internet era, due to a variety of conflicting information dating back to the film's initial release. The German press spread a rumor that Schreck was actually a pseudonym for Alfred Abel, who had previously worked with Creator/FWMurnau on ''Phantom'' and later starred in ''Film/{{Metropolis}}'', a claim repeated in some books into the 1980s;[[note]]this despite Schreck appearing at promotional events for ''Nosferatu'', and even costarring with Abel in Murnau's ''The Grand Duke's Finances''[[/note]] other sources went further, claiming that Orlok was an unknown actor using Schreck's name. Greek film historian Adonis Kyru [[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-books-dracula-schreck/book-lifts-lid-on-star-of-eerie-first-dracula-film-idUSL0983779720080509 joked]] in an essay on the movie that Schreck's performance was so convincing that Murnau must have cast a ''real'' vampire as Orlok, an idea which later inspired the film ''Film/ShadowOfTheVampire''. Schreck himself was an eccentric loner who rarely granted interviews or socialized with collaborators, which did nothing to dispel the rumors.