Friedrich Wilhelm "F.W." Murnau (born Friedrich Wilhelm Plumpe on December 28, 1888, in Bielefeld, Germany; died March 11, 1931, in Santa Barbara, California) was a highly influential German film director of the silent era. He was a prominent figure in the German Expressionist movement of the 1920s. Murnau's early interests included literature and film. Before dedicating himself to cinema, he studied philology in Berlin and art history in Heidelberg. He also became involved in theater and worked with director Max Reinhardt. During World War I, he served in the German army and air force, surviving multiple plane crashes.
Murnau is best known for directing Nosferatu (1922), a classic horror film and an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula. Despite copyright issues, the film is considered a masterpiece of German Expressionist cinema. Other notable works include The Last Laugh (1924) and Faust (1926). In 1926, Murnau moved to Hollywood and joined Fox Studio, where he directed Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927), a film considered one of the greatest of the silent era. Murnau died in a car accident in 1931, shortly before the premiere of his film Tabu.
In a bizarre turn of events, it was discovered in 2015 that Murnau's skull was stolen from his grave in Stahnsdorf, Germany. The theft remains unresolved.