Shadow of the Vampire 2000

Susan Stark, Detroit News: The premise is witty. Read more

Jane Sumner, Dallas Morning News: A vivid, transporting, not easily forgotten homage to genius and the cinema. Read more

A.O. Scott, New York Times: Shadow of the Vampire has a weird, flickering magic that is hard to dispel. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: Dafoe brings a terrifying realism to a character long steeped in mystery. Read more

Hap Erstein, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: An ingenious, diabolical, probably libelous, funhouse of a movie. Read more

Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times: Willem Dafoe's performance in Shadow of the Vampire is so irresistible it not only breaks that cycle but turns an otherwise just adequate film into something everyone will want to take a look at. Read more

Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader: This stupid and demeaning fantasy about the shooting of F.W. Murnau's 1922 masterpiece Nosferatu is a piece of postmodernist kitsch whose only redeeming quality is an enjoyably over-the-top, eye-rolling performance by Willem Dafoe. Read more

Eric Harrison, Houston Chronicle: Dafoe's boundary-pushing yet calibrated performance will crack you up. Read more

Steven Rosen, Denver Post: Clever. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: A feast of fangs bared acting by two exemplars of the form, John Malkovich and Willem Dafoe. Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: Out of such dizzying layers of (un)reality, some sublime films have emerged. Nosferatu was one of them, and this is not -- but, c'mon, credit it with the old college try, a pretty decent effort. Read more

Michael Atkinson, Mr. Showbiz: Shadow of the Vampire might be the most original film of the year. Read more

Peter Rainer, New York Magazine/Vulture: It's a marvelous, resonant joke that never quite succeeds: Stretches of the film resemble a Dario Argento horrorfest crossed with a Mel Brooks spoof. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: In addition to having a wonderful conceit as the basis of the plot and featuring two superlative lead performances, the film pays homage to its inspiration. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: The movie does an uncanny job of re-creating the visual feel of Murnau's film. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: An academic exercise driven by adolescent ideas that never shape themselves into a narrative. Read more

Edward Guthmann, San Francisco Chronicle: Dafoe never reverts to campy, movie-monster gestures but seems liberated, consumed by his character, inspired to give a performance that's intuitive and otherworldly. Read more

David Edelstein, Slate: The screenplay, by Steven Katz, suffers from arch, almost unspeakably theatrical dialogue, and, as Murnau, John Malkovich recites his lines as if monomania were synonymous with monotonic: He drains the drama of blood. Read more

Geoff Andrew, Time Out: Intriguing, eccentric, sporadically entertaining tosh (but tosh all the same). Read more

Todd McCarthy, Variety: Wholly absorbing and inspired in parts, this carefully crafted curio dares to suggest that Murnau made a Faustian pact with an actual vampire to play the title role in exchange for the neck of the film's leading lady at production's end. Read more

J. Hoberman, Village Voice: Manages to turn a highly dubious concept into a subtle and deliciously mordant comedy. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: Diabolically amusing without plunging into the Mel Brooks zone. Read more