10 Most Influential Directors Of All Time

4. F.W. Murnau

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcyzubFvBsA F.W. Murnau invented the horror genre as we know it while also pioneering the enormously influential style of German Expressionism in film. He gave cinema its greatest and most recognizable monster with Count Dracula in his masterpiece Nosferatu and also brought a German folk legend to life with his silent classic Faust. Werner Herzog has claimed that Nosferatu is the greatest film to ever come out of Germany and Murnau's style is clearly evident in Herzog's films as well. Herzog even directed a re-imagined version of Nosferatu in 1979 that is a masterpiece on its own right. You can really see how important Murnau's work was by watching films like Dracula, The Exorcist and Night of the Living Dead since each one of those movies borrows from German Expressionism in a very subtle way that elevates the horror and tone of the stories presented.