Philm | Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) | Werner Herzog

Herzog's classic remake of a remake of Bram Stoker's novel Dracula will prefigure our upcoming discussion on immortality and its liabilities. This masterful interpretation with Bruno Ganz, Isabelle Adjani and Klaus Kinski is as beautiful as it is thought-provoking.

• the film
• a discussion

Vampire logic
A vampire may, as one commentator put it, develop a taste for atheists... In Herzog’s Nosferatu, Dracula is eager to leave backward Transylvania for “enlightened” England. He acquires the soul and identity of those whose lifeblood he consumes. For an atheist, there is no God, hence no expectation of immortality, hence no eternal condemnation to live, hence a prescribed end to his eternal suffering from eternal desire. To “desire” implies not having. To not have is to suffer... Eating believers, creatures desirous of eternal life, has led to eternal indigestion.

DRACULA: “My God, I can’t wait to eat some atheists.” (as paraphrased in the Netflix rendition)1

Dracula wants to make “nothing burgers,” so to speak, out of atheists. Their nutritional value may be lacking, but he seems to have had enough of value.

1. According to Storylosopher.

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