You would need to be as blind as a bat not to think that Max Shreck didn’t share some resemblance with a bloodsucker. The unadorned, rodent-like appearance of the man just begs for such a comparison; a comparison that encourages screenwriter Steven Katz to pen the ambitious and intriguing Shadow of the Vampire. It is a fictionalized story recounting the making of Nosferatu with the assumption that its director, F.W. Murnau, cast a genuine vampire for his 1922 classic.

John Malkovich is perfectly cast as the egomaniacal and questionably evil Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau, a brilliant filmmaker obsessed about realizing his vision of the perfect vampire film. In the spirit of a true director, Murnau uses any means necessary to create a realistic atmosphere for his actors. His leading lady Greta (Catherine McCormack) accuses him of scaring the hell out of her with all the "spooky shit" he’s been saying to motivate her character. His producer, Albin Grau (Udo Kier), wishes he would shoot within the confines of a studio rather than the more costly and distant location of Czechoslovakia. Finally, and even more bizarre and unbeknownst to his crew, the secretive auteur has retained the services of one Max Shreck, a mysterious "character" actor who just happens to be a genuine vampire.

Made up from head to toe, Willem Dafoe is the vampire Max Shreck. His performance is subtle and, at times, over the top. And Shreck’s pureness of evil and the tragedy of character are in perfect balance. Unlike the spit-polished persona of an aristocratic Count Dracula, Katz’s vampire isn’t living high on the blood of mortals; he is a lonely ghoul, longing for the warmth of the sun and forced to suck on the lifeblood of small vermin. In one scene, a drunken Albin witnesses Shreck’s feral nature as he violently pulls a bat from flight and viciously feeds on its blood. The repulsed producer can only give applause to what he sees as profound method acting, whilst Shreck steals away with a bottle of liquor to drown his misery. As a viewer, the scene succeeds in underscoring the enfeebled nature of this vampire who has but one attainable desire: as payment for taking on the role of Count Orlock, Shreck wishes to feed upon the blood of the lovely Greta. The self-serving Murnau is more than willing to oblige the lustful bloodsucker and sees the final coupling of the two as a moment of absolute realism. Unfortunately his deal with the devil backfires, and Shreck proceeds to make a buffet out of the arrogant director’s crew. This drives Murnau into a drug-induced breakdown that threatens to derail his film.

It’s a pity that such a promising film was scarred by what I saw as a rush to tell a rather densely packed story. I’m not saying that Director Merhige should have spoon fed the plot to the audience. But at a scant 93 minutes, parts of the film, and especially its ending, suffered from what I saw as overly compressed editing. While I suppose it’s possible Universal may have tried to jam this proverbial "vampire" film into the running time of a typical horror movie, such a presumption would be pure speculation. For all I know the multiple "fade to black" segues and annoyingly episodic scenes weren’t attempts at covering plot holes but truly integral to the film’s visual style.

Image-wise the photography in Shadow of the Vampire was rich and crisp, while some indoor and night scenes looked murky. Merhige does mention how his cinematographer, Lou Bogue, endeavored to mimic the lighting of Baroque painter Caravaggio, but the overall effect had a tendency to hide much of the surrounding action and cause images to appear out of focus. In many cases, I found myself straining to see these images in my darkened room, and at one point, I decided to recalibrate my television for fear that it may be at fault. Sadly, my efforts were to no avail.

Some indistinct dialogue from a hissing Dafoe was the only flaw in a well-produced, yet fitting, unassuming soundtrack. Also worth mentioning was the music of relative newcomer Dan Jones, which did a nice job conveying an emotionally unsettled, yet beautiful mood. As has been the case for many DTS/Dolby Digital selectable discs, the DTS-encoded tracks proved to be more dynamic and crisp than their counterpart.

Creature feature-wise (sorry, I couldn’t help myself), Shadow of the Vampire’s extras were pretty anemic. Individual interviews with Producer Nicholas Cage, Director Merhige, and Willem Dafoe were brief and superficial, and the short production featurette wasn’t even comparable to the excellent examples set by Terry Gilliam’s 12 Monkeys or Superman: The Movie. Lackluster production stills and notes also added to extras that served to make the DVD look feature-packed from a marketing perspective rather than an enthusiast’s perspective. Although Director Merhige’s commentary did contain a high "smooch-fest factor," it did manage to convey an interesting level of information and subtext about the production. This alone saved the features portion of the DVD from receiving less than two stars.