Friderich Wilhelm Murnau, by the real name Wilhelm Plumpe (December, 28th
1888, Bielefeld, Germany – March, 11th 1931, Santa Barbara, USA), is one of the
most significant German directors of silent films. He came from a family of
wealthy textile merchants. Early in his youth he was interested in art,
especially literature and theatre. He studied philology, music and visual arts
in Berlin and Heidelberg. He was an active member of a student theatre where he
was spotted by the famous director Max Reinhardt, who engaged him as an actor
and assistant director. During WW I he was a pilot. After a forced landing in
Switzerland he was hospitalized. Later he started to direct in theatre, and made
commercial films for the German embassy. He returned to Berlin in 1919 and fully
devoted himself to film. He made a debut with Der Knabe in Blau (1919).
In the next five years he made 14 mostly commercial films – among others
Satanas (1919) and Der Januskopf (1920), an unofficial adaptation of
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Most of those films were lost but it is presumed
that they were extremely visually attractive, partly because of the
collaboration with the famous German cinematographer Karl Freund as well as
because of Murnau’s own exquisite artistic taste. From those films that have
been saved – such as Der gang in die Nacht (1920) and Schloss Vogelöd
(1921) – it is obvious that Murnau loved the horror genre. He earned the
reputation as on of the most respectable German directors with his tenth film
Nosferatu-eine Symphonie des Grauens (1922). But his next films Phantom
(1922), Die Austreibung (1923), Die Finanzen des Großherzogs
(1924) – didn’t receive much attention. Even so, with his film Der letzte
Mann (1924) he only confirmed his reputation. Having achieved international
success, he made his next two films in the context of an ambitious producing
plan – a breakthrough of German film into the American market. So, he adapted
Moliere’s theatre play Herr Tartüff (1926) and Goethe’s Faust
(1926). As a result of their success (above all Faust) he signed a
contract with the Fox studio in the US. The producer William Fox
gave him complete creative freedom and ensured good financial support for the
film Sunrise (1927). Even though it received two Oscars (at the first
Oscar’s ever) and it got great reviews, this film never achieved the financial
success that was expected, and consequently Murnau lost his status in the
studio. He partly earned back his reputation with a circus melodrama Four
Devils (1929). The commercial success of this film gave him a chance to make
City Girl (1930), an epic story of earning the daily bread. This
film, made in the time of silent films, and finished at the time of sound films,
was a big commercial failure, (Murnau opposed the adding of sound to the film
and thus it was late for distribution and became less interesting for the
audience). Taboo (1931) was his last film (shot independently from 1928
with financial help of Paramount studio). Only a week before its
premiere, F. W. Murnau died in a car accident. He is considered to be one of the
most talented German authors of the silent era and one of the greatest film
artists in general.