Rating: 
Summary: Somebody forgot the 'un' in 'undead'.
Review: 'Shadow of the Vampire' was a big disappointment. Although marketed as a kind of comedy or spoof of obsessive movie-making, it is nothing of the sort, with the exception of the recreations of 'Nosferatu' itself, which are improbable, but amusing. It fails as a 'Gods and Monsters'-type investigation of a great gay director working in the horror genre, and the tensions between his life and his work, because Murnau, like all the characters here, is given no life, just a few mannerisms and long-winded speeches about obsession and art. It's not much of a recreation of 20s Berlin (presumably due to budget limitations), or the exigencies of film-making. As a fantasy about the latter, it is distinctly un-fantastic, replacing Murneau's eerieness with muffle. The problem with 'Shadow' is that it wants to be an intellectual film, imposing its themes on the narrative, rather than letting them arise unobtrusively from it. It wants to make all sorts of connections between vampirism, film-making and stardom, for example showing how the director sucks the life out of his actors to give them a dubious 'undead' immortality in cinematic afterlife. It assumes that the audience has seen 'Nosferatu' and read Bram Stoker's novel 'Dracula', on which it is based, and so can construct a narrative momentum itself, by ticking off all the mirrored scenes, allusions and recreations. Certainly, they didn't bother to create any themselves. By the end, I was baffled and frustrated, ignorant as what I was supposed to be watching. On the positive side, when my local cinema showed this, it provoked such interest that accompanying screenings of Murnau's film were packed. Which can only be a good thing.
Rating:
Summary: great acting,.. excellent cinematography,.. poor story line
Review: I give one star to the excellent performances of Willem Dafoe, John Malkovich, and Catherine McCormack; and one to that of great film making. The cast was fantastic; they were able to hold together what little story there actually was. Slow at times, the photography, depicting the early days of German black and white silent films was very good; the character make-up and dress was also. The real shocker was the end: so lame and predictable that I couldn't believe they actually did it. They must have bored themselves trying to think of a finale; the weak finish ...[took]the life right out of the story.
Rating: 
Summary: Nice bust, nice hips, what a waste!
Review: There are enough other reviews that I do not have to comment on the action in the film. I would like, however, to give my impressions. The film is busty at the beginning and finishes with nice rounded hips at the end. The middle, however, is lacking. It is unnaturally skinny like a too corsetted waist.
The beginning of this film is almost magical. We are taken to 1922 to the filming of one of the best silent films ever made. The camera work and dark lighting blend with a well written script to transport the viewer to actually sitting on the set with one of the early masters of film. Mystery, intrique, and suspense are thick. What evil lies with the mystery member of the cast? This magical mastery continues up until the second third of the film. At this point, after we see a member of the film crew get eaten on the staged ship, it appears that director Merhige ran out of budget/time/imagination. In order to show the progression of the Marnau's film making, we are subjected to a series of harsh jump-cuts. These cuts are disjointed and not clearly linked to the rest of the action. I so very much wish we could see what ended up on the cutting room floor. I think this story could have been much richer had there been a bit more continuity in the middle.
Despite what some other reviewiers had to say, I liked the ending. It is a nice rounded ending that brings us back to Marnau's obsession/insanity. We are returned to another progression of suspense in these last few scenes. The film starts making sense again and there is once again motivation for the action. We are left to think on the plausibility of what just took place. Did things really happen that way? There is no way to prove it didn't!
I wish I could leave just thinking on this question. But instead, I find myself wondering what happened in the middle of the film? What other character dimensions am I missing because of the horrible story telling in the middle? Can this film be repaired to make it the masterpiece that it should be? <sigh> What a waste.
Rating: 
Summary: this is hardly youre picture any longer!
Review: director f.w.marnau had an obbession,to create the worlds most realistic vampire movie,and he dug up an actor "I'd like some makeup" "well,you dont get anything" who didnt just play the part "but youre not feeding,and youre not drinking her blood" he lived it "what is the matter with you?" from lionsgate films,and producer nicholas cage,comes the haunting tale of the uncompromising "you will have no closeups,nada" the unimaginable "blood,blood!" and the undead academy award nominee john malkovich "I will finsh my picture!" and william dafoe "this is hardly youre picture any longer!" SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE "how dare you destroy my photographer!" "why not the script girl?" "I'll eat her later!"
Rating: 
Summary: A waste Of time
Review: I went to this mvie with my friend. This was the worst crap i have ever seen.Boring and Slow. Im glad I didnt pay for this trash.
Rating:
Summary: Incredibly boring...
Review: I rate the DVD media and image/sound quality with four stars. The movie itself???? ..... incredibly boring. The only DVD that I have given away because I KNOW I will never watch it again....this coming from someone who keeps an extensive library of DVDs. I can see that this movie was artistically well done and the performance by Willem Dafoe was great....however, the film just did not hold my interest and I am getting a bit burned out with Malkavich's type casting as a deranged lunatic.
Rating:
Summary: A great idea not taken to its full potential
Review: I had high hopes going in to SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE. Willem Dafoe's Oscar-nominated performance looked like it would be a lot of fun, and the idea behind the movie (a movie director making a pact with a vampire) seemed to be something I would relish as both a movie fan and a fan of the vampire genre. Alas, Merhige's SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE is a slight, only occasionally successful movie full of characters that are only partially drawn. John Malkovich's F.W. Murnau is barely fleshed out at all, and his scenes with Dafoe's Max Schreck often seem to only consist of him yelling at his star to stop killing the film crew. The movie starts well (extremely well), with Merhige setting up his situation by keeping Shreck off-screen until just the right moment. But once Shreck is there and the joke is played out, there's not much left for the movie to do. And the structure falls apart completely. Scenes seem to be disjointed, having no connection with the movie as a whole. Events happen with absolutely no setup, and we are often left to wonder how we got from point A to point C without any B to lead the way. It makes me wonder if perhaps production problems or post-production editing got in the way. Dafoe is truly delicious as Shreck and stands out above the otherwise forgettable cast (including comedian Eddie Grizzard, who has very little fun in his role as Nosferatu's romantic lead). Dafoe has fun in his role as a vampire-turned-actor, but again, he is hampered by a screenplay structure that leaves his character in the shadows. One scene truly is a standout and shows the potential of what the movie could have been. Nosferatu's producers are sitting on the set downing a bottle of schnapps, when Schreck happens by. He joins them for a drink as they question him (they think jokingly, but he thinks seriously) about what it's like to be a vampire. In this one scene, we see the mistaken-identity possibility that Merhige seems to want to set up. But more importantly, we see the pain and desperation that has led a once noble vampire to take a job as an actor. The scene plays out beautifully, but then the movie rushes forward to confusing and unsatisfying conclusion. SHADOW OF A VAMPIRE leaves many funny and even thought-provoking possibilities left unexplored. It's a shame that Dafoe's bravura performance (and the incredible make-up job he sports) are lost in this minor effort.
Rating: 
Summary: Murnau lost in the shadows
Review: What kind of a man would be so driven that he would make a pact with a real vampire and then sacrifice human beings to the fulfilment of his artistic vision? Well, the makers of Shadows exquisitely meander around this question but, sadly, fail to expand the scope of the movie to answer it. And even sadder is that answering this question, or at least providing the clues, the evidence, the little snippets of F.W. Murnau's life, would have made richer a movie that for the most part is a concept and not a full-fledged exploration. The filmmakers had one of two options with the way with movies go nowadays- either turn this into a horror story, a slight more novel and innovative take on the vampire genre, or make an intelligent movie about the ambitions of a man. The result falls somewhere in the middle. This is an intelligent, artistic movie, no doubt, but the very severity of its plot screams out for an exploration of the man who is at its center. The one glimpse into Murnau's personal life comes very early on and is very vague. I guess they were trying to avoid a 'gay movie' label by evincing Murnau's homosexuality- useless, the people who won't see this because its got a gay protagonist would also probably not see it because it's artistic. Beyond what is a unique and novel plot, Shadows also had a very interesting real-life person in Murnau, a glitzy period in history, and a unique supporting cast of characters, to delve into. Sadly, Shadows doesn't go beyond the setup. Murnau, who finally got some recognition recently in the novel Nosferatu, is once more nudged into the shadows of a monster less complex than the demons that troubled him. Yet, this is still an intelligent and enjoyable film, helped immensely by stunning performances from Willem Dafoe and the masterful John Malkovich.
Rating:
Summary: An interesting take on an old subject.
Review: I had some problems with gaps in the storyline and there was some excess grain in the picture (especially one scene by a campfire), but I still enjoyed the film. The performances (especially Willem Dafoe as the vampire) were excellent and the ending really worked for me. This would have been a five star film easily if they had tightened up the story a bit. We tried watching the film this was based on (Nosferatu) a couple of months ago, but couldn't make it halfway through the thing. Can't get into B&W silent films, I guess.
Rating:
Summary: good movie with good acting
Review: this movie was a bit confusing for me at first cause i didn't get it i wasn't sure if max shrek was supossed to actually be a vampire in this movie or if he just was in his own mind.but if he was an actual vampire in this movie then i don't get the part towards the end when greta see's that shrek has no reflection in the mirror but after he bites her and is just lying his head on her if you look in the mirror you can see his head in the mirror(can some1 tell me if this is an error in the film or what?)but anyway i got it on dvd i already watched it twice so if you are into dark intense movies then get this i think it's worth it just for the great acting alone...
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