Screening of the 1922 silent film Nosferatu with live piano accompaniment of the original score.
Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror comes to the Calvary Church Chapel on Friday, October 30, as part of a run from October 29 to 31. It's a screening of the 1922 silent film Nosferatu with a live piano score, and the timing puts it right in the thick of Halloween weekend.
If you're not familiar, Nosferatu is a cornerstone of German Expressionism, directed by F. W. Murnau. It's an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula, and it doesn't hold back on the gothic atmosphere. The story follows Thomas Hutter, a real estate agent who travels to Transylvania and crosses paths with the sinister Count Orlok. When Orlok eventually makes his way to a German port town, he brings a trail of plague and death with him. It's a slow-burn horror that relies on shadows and distorted angles rather than jumpscares, and it's one of those films that still feels eerie over a century later.
Because it's a silent movie, the music does a lot of the heavy lifting. In this version, the score is performed live on piano, which changes the experience from watching a movie to something closer to a concert. The piano follows the action on screen, so the mood shifts in real time rather than being a pre-recorded track. It's the kind of thing that works best in a room like the Calvary Church Chapel, where you can actually hear the notes as they happen.
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There's a performance on Friday, October 30, and the whole run spans October 29 through 31, so you've got a few nights to choose from. The chapel is at 4740 Baltimore Ave in West Philly, and the show on the 29th starts at 7 PM.
