- Director
- Carl Theodor Dreyer
- Year
- 1932
- Country
- France, Germany
- Runtime
- 75 min
Also released as
- Castle of Doom
- Not Against the Flesh
- The Vampire
- Vampyr, la bruja vampiro
- 뱀파이어
- Вампир: Сон Алена Грея
- Vampirul
- Wampir
- 吸血鬼
- Βαμπίρ
- Vampyr, ou l'étrange aventure de David Gray
- O Vampiro
- Vampiro
- Vampyr - Il vampiro
- The Strange Adventure of David Gray
Filed under
Vampyr
Dreyer shooting through gauze at a plot that barely exists. Closer to a bad dream than a film.
Dreyer's first sound film, barely has a plot, and is one of the most unnerving things ever shot.
A young man arrives at an inn in a French village. There is a girl with a wasting illness, a doctor, an old woman, and shadows that move independently of the people casting them.
The soft, milky look was achieved by shooting through a piece of gauze held in front of the lens, discovered by accident when light bounced off a mirror during a test. Dreyer kept it for the whole film.
The famous sequence is a burial from inside the coffin, with a glass panel over the face, the ceiling and treetops sliding past. Nobody had filmed a point of view like that before.
It was financed by a Dutch baron on the condition he could play the lead, which he does, badly, under a pseudonym. It does not matter at all.
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Trailer
The sleeves
The same film, sold as a different film in each territory. Click any of them.
Where to watch
Australia
Canada
Germany
Finland
USA
Legal sources only. Availability data from JustWatch via TMDB.
Checked 9 Aug 2026
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