Vampyr (1932)
Another German horror film from the early days. And again, about vampires. It begins: "This story is about the adventures of young Allan Gray." It informs us that he has become a dreamer, someone for whom the boundary between reality and that which is unreal has been blurred, all due to his studies of devil worship and vampire terror. Courtempierre is the name of the town in which the story begins; he has arrived there after one of the many "aimless journeys". As he knocks on the door, several times, he looks around. He sees a woman on an upper level close a window hurriedly. Further off, a man with a scythe is walking towards the river... to begin ringing a bell. A woman lets him in and shows him to his room.
He hears talking and wanders the house, finding no one but a locked door. Then, as he lies awake in his room later that night, there is a knocking at his door. It slowly opens, and an older gentlement comes into the room. When asked who he is, the man just goes to the window and opens the shade, turns around and says "quiet", more to himself than to Allan, and then proclaims to Allan that "she must not die. Do you hear?" Finally, he walks over to the desk, and writes "To be opened after my death" on some bound papers before he leaves the room. It is a weird scene which certainly leaves the audience with a strong sense of foreboding.
Hmm. He has gone to a lot of effort to seal this and keep them secret until he dies.... perhaps I should follow him until he is dead, and then I can read them! Ha! Good idea.
Allan arrives at a house, and a strange older man asks if he heard a noise. When Allan responds that he has indeed heard the cries of a child, the man informs him that there are no children there. Nor are there any dogs, as suggested by Allan as a rebuttal. Allan leaves, and we see the elder gentlemen help an even older lady walk to a different bench. Skulls follow their movement. She then hands him a jar of poison. Allan has continued his journey, and we rejoin him as he discovers a chateau, the house where the strange man who entered his room lives. It is a secluded location, and he lives there with his two daughters, the youngest, Giséle and one who has "wounds",Leóne, and their servants.
This man falls to the floor as if stricken... by a bullet that we never see shot. But the servants and one of the daughters come running. Allan enters the house seeing that he has fallen through a window and tries to help. There is nothing to be done, unfrortunately, as the man dies, his eyes staring out, terrified at something to which we the audience are not privy. Moving his body to another room, one of the servants declares that Allan will stay the night with them.
As one of the servants leaves to inform the police, Allan pulls the sealed packet out of his jacket. We see him open a book which is titled "The History of Vampires" by a Paul Bonnard. We learn about these demons known as vampires and why, even though dead, they arise from their graves - due to the terrible deeds they did while living. They must take the blood of children and young people in order to prolong their own lives. It claims that the Prince of Darkness is their companions, and the book claims that the victim will slowly fade away with no hope of salvation. We also see the wounded sister in bed asleep and then suddenly gone.
Suddenly, Giléle sees her through the window as she is walking through the field. Allan and the young woman take off after her, until they discover her. They find her bent over backward on a stump. Did they see the man who was just leaning over her? Or did they just see her? We don't know. The servants, having heard the shouting for Leóne and come to help carry the young lady back to the chateau. Upon arrival, Leóne awakens and states that she is damned. Though horrified at first, her visage quickly changes to one of disturbing amusement. She grins horribly and watches her sister Giséle walk, scared, from one side of the room to the other so that she can leave her sister's terrifying presence.
Giséle later declares that her sister is dying and seems to enter a state of shock. The carriage then returns without anyone riding it and blood dripping on the ground beneath it. Allan returns to read the book and discovers that the shadows of executed cirminals as well as human beings, usually those who have devoted their souls to the Devil, can be manipulated into doing as a vampyr wishes. The doctor who arrives to help Leóne is none other than the town doctor, the man he ran into when he thought he heard a child.
The doctor informs everyone that Leóne needs a blood transfusion. He looks at Allan and asks if he'll give his blood, then informing him that he will bleed Allan. While this happens, we get a brief glimpse at Giséle who wonders why the doctor only comes at night. Though he is certainly suspicious, the audience does not get the sense that the doctor is a vampire. But is he? We also see more snippets from the book. One claims that the vampyr attempts to drive the victim to suicide. The other explains that a village killed an elderly female vampyr by finding her asleep and driving a metal bar in her heart.
Yup. Normal, everyday occurence. Skeletal hand handing out some poison to share. Nothing weird about that at all.
While a servant is reading this book, we see the shadow of the door open and then shut. Just the shadow. The door remains as it is. We see Allan asleep, and he sees a skeletal hand reach for poison and then reach out to give it to someone. The scene switches to show a hand reach for the poison. A servant enters and awakens Allan claiming that there is danger. They chase the doctor out of Leóne's room and realize that she has been poisoned when they see the vial drop from the doctor's hand.
Giséle is missing, and Allan, or rather, Allan's shade or shadow, follows the doctor to a castle where he discovers Giséle been kept locked up in a room. He then sees a coffin and removes the cloth covering it to discover his body, apparently awake and alive but paralized. They close his coffin with the lid, which has a window so that he can see what is happening to him. He sees the elderly woman from the doctor's house (perhaps it was his office... I don't remember very clearly what the building was... but you know what I'm saying!). He is then carried off, past a church whose bells are ringing, to bury him.
Damn. Really sucks to be Allan. First he gives up his blood, then he's buried alive. Such a bummer. Ach, well. Better luck next time, Allan!
His shade is then at a cemetery where he recognizes one of the servants who is opening up a crypt. Allan heads over to help the man, and they open the coffin to reveal the elderly woman. The servant continues and follows the books instructions, hammering a metal rod into the heart of the creature. Leóne, back at the house, awakens and claims that she feels better, stronger.
A storm kicks up and worries the doctor and one of his henchmen. They look worriedly out the window, where the face of the girls' father appears. Fearful, the doctor runs into another room where the door shuts behind him and locks itself. We see shadows moving about before he runs out. He see the body of the henchman at the bottom of the stairs just after we hear a scream. Then Allan's shade appears and frees Giséle from the rope that has her tied up and the room in which she has been stashed. They run off. The doctor has fled, and finds himself in a flour mill. He can't see who is in there with him, but someone starts the machinery, and he is buried alive unders tons upon tons of flour. The young couple continue their journey and end up in a bright, sunny field.
I have more to add... but that will have to come as an update later!!
Go forth in fear!
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