Why Is F. W. Murnau Important

The Importance of F.W. Murnau in Film
F.W. Murnau, the early 20th Century German silent film director, was able to make his audiences scream, cower in fear, and gasp agape in wonder. Murnau was the director of twenty-one German and American films, and although many of his films have been lost or destroyed by time, he was, and remains a visionary of film’s modern era. Through his artistry, he established German Expressionism as a significant movement in silent film (Harvard Film Archive, 2004). Murnau, born Friedrich Wilhelm Plumpe on December 28, 1888 in Bielefeld, Germany (he would later change his last name to Murnau), was raised in a large and wealthy family and was a graduate of the University of Heidelberg, University of Berlin. At
Faust’s opening scene captures the Archangel Michael and Satan in a set that is exquisitely ethereal with clouds made from glass wool. Prior to his meeting with Doctor Faust, Satan hovers menacingly—his enormous shrouded wings tremble over the plague-ridden town, completely encompassing it with diseased darkness. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse gallop with urgency through a fog-filled sky symbolizing the arrival of the Antichrist, giving the audience a full sense of dark foreboding. Murnau innovations in Faust include using multiple cameras to shoot a scene, distorted angles and perspectives, and the use of elaborate miniature sets (“Faust” 2013). In one scene Murnau used what appeared to be massive and lumbering, (though mechanical), elephants. Faust was the last film Murnau would make in Germany, and it was the impetus for Fox Studios in Hollywood to offer Murnau a lucrative movie contract. Faust, almost a century after its debut, remains an everlasting cinematic feat and feast for our eyes and our
Murnau, in many scenes, employs windows to represent doom; Orlok’s decaying castle represents death and destruction. In the film, the Black Plague infests the town of Wisborg. The townspeople are terrified and bolt their doors and windows from this ominous bacterial pillager. There are two intertwined symbolic interpretations here. The 1918-1919 Influenza Pandemic killed approximately 50 to 100 million people and infected a total of one 500 million worldwide (J.K. Taubenberger & D.M. Morenst, 2006). Additionally, World War I, (1914-1918) took over two million German lives (A. Prost, 2014) making the war also pertinent. Certainly, the pandemic and the war were still fresh in the minds of the filmmakers and moviegoers in 1922, the year Nosferatu was released. The pandemic of influenza and the war, without doubt “plagued” the world, so this combined interpretation is plausible (M. Mulvey-Roberts, p.194). A more covert interpretation involves anti-Semitism (G. Fuller,2013). During the Middle Ages the Jews were blamed for transmitting the plague (R. Halsall, 1996). Because Jews were often escaping pogroms and other persecutions, they many times immigrated to other countries to seek safety. Thus, Jews frequently became scapegoats and were seen as bringing disease with them. Rats are believed to be the carriers of the plague; therefore, Jews became associated with rats. Additionally, in the film, Jewish physical