The following article reviews a movie that contains graphic and explicit content. Reader discretion is advised.
As horror often serves as social commentary, how do you remake a classic over 100 years later, in a different cultural context and climate?
Robert Eggers knows how.
Eggers’ “Nosferatu” is a present-day take on the 1922 classic horror and silent film “Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror.” It follows Ellen, a haunted woman played by Lily-Rose Depp, who made a pact with Bill Skarsgård’s Count Orlok, also known as Nosferatu, as she was seeking comfort from the darkness inside her.
Many years later, her husband Thomas Hutter (Nicholas Hoult), a real estate agent, is sent on a journey by his boss to sell a house to the mysterious Count Orlok — who lives in Transylvania — leaving his wife with their friends. When he arrives, he takes ill and unknowingly signs away Ellen to the Count for just a sack of gold. Then, Count Orlok travels to their hometown, bringing the plague before the story concludes.
In her husband’s absence, Ellen’s darkness sparks turmoil inside her, and she dreams of the Count through the night, as he haunts her nightmares. This twilight offers her insight into her life, giving her visions of the future.
The original “Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror” — based on the 1897 book “Dracula” — follows a similar plot, but many characters are not as fleshed out due to the restraints of it being a silent film and 50 minutes shorter than the new one.
I thought this would take a hit on the pacing of the film, but each moment serves a purpose for the story or builds suspense for something to come.
The horror from the original film came mostly from how Count Orlok looked: his piercing eyes and sharp features were something audiences had never seen before. In the original film, he is a striking anti-Semetic representation of many of Germany’s stereotypical views at the time towards Jewish people, depicted as a bald, bushy eyebrowed man who is infiltrating Germany, bringing the plague, and taking advantage of the women who live there.
The physical features are lost to time in the remake, which focused on modernizing this scare-factor to today’s standards. While points crucial to the plot stay, they are reshaped to forget about the troubled origin of their writing.
Eggers seems to take these themes and adapts them to the modern diminishment of female voices.
Ellen is undoubtedly the star of this movie despite her rather small role in the original, captivating the audience in every moment she is on screen. With every writhe and bellow of horror, she engulfs you in the moment. It’s almost a surreal experience.
She makes you uncomfortable in the best way possible.
Ellen is the center-stone of this movie, and she paves the path for each character’s outcome. Her battle within herself determines whether those around her live or die.
For the curse of Nosferatu to be undone, she must not only accept the darkness within her but do so willingly. For each day she denies herself, more horror unfolds. She serves as both the protagonist and antagonist, causing good and bad to happen, as you root for her the entire time.
The insight she gains from her visions is often immediately shut down by the men around her, and you see the disrespect she feels.
Depp’s acting is so unsettling that she is one of the scariest things in the movie; her blood vessels pop as she musters up words, and you feel like she must speak or she will choke on them.
This movie speaks volumes about not only how women were treated in the 1830s but how they are still disregarded today. Not only are her opinions constantly bashed, but the feelings she has are often suppressed and she is told not to speak of them.
A majority of the darkness she grapples with is desire.
Her constant struggle with her desire is restrained and shackled by those around her, bringing into question the shackles she places on herself and illustrating how women — including her closest friend — internalize the misogyny of the time.
This conversation within herself is behind the whole overarching story. The way her sexuality is expressed is paralleled by other characters, bringing into question whether the evil is within desire itself or in how it’s expressed.
The only character to really let her speak and who is willing to listen to her is Willem Dafoe’s Pr. Alvin Eberhart von Franz, a doctor who has been ostracized for his obsession with the occult. He not only draws focus for his subtle comedic relief — which lightened the mood when he was on screen — but he seems aware of Ellen’s foresight and how the story will play out.
Dafoe plays this character perfectly and understands his role as a supporting character: the one to guide (and misguide) the others with his knowledge of the curse of Nosferatu.
One of Eggers’ strongest points has always been his cinematography.
Every movie he makes is filled with iconic shots that stick with you after watching, and this movie is no exception.
Some scenes feel grand and make you feel small in comparison to the size of the terror unfolding in front of you, while others force you agonizingly close to the action.
Eggers hides things from the camera so perfectly that your mind can’t help but scare yourself, making the final reveal excruciatingly engaging. Each scene feels like a song coming to its climax before thrusting you into the pinnacle of his moment.
The use of colors and shadows subconsciously embraces you, helping you experience what those living the moment feel. Eggers and his crew made custom filters for the cameras, creating these beautiful greyscale shots that still let fiery oranges through, allowing the darkness engulfing everything but the streetlights.
Finally, Count Orlok is one scary vampire.
Skarsgård’s voice embodies the power and sickness of the famed Dracula. With zero editing in post, the deep roar seems to echo far beyond him, piercing through you as you watch.
Each line is memorable, and I found myself quoting and trying to impersonate him days after watching it.
Visually, he is a monstrous amalgamation of everything his voice makes you think of.
His skin rots, and scars are scattered across him.
His hands are lanky and crowned with gross, terribly long nails.
Nothing about him is appealing, and he truly represents the darkness within Ellen that she struggles so hard to come to terms with.
Trying my best not to spoil, I think this story represents the freedom and peace that you can attain from accepting every part of yourself. The distraught Ellen faces is from fighting with herself relentlessly and trying to suppress what she wants just for the sake of others.
For a vampire movie, the takeaway is oddly enough to accept what makes you, you.
Eggers took a movie esteemed due to its boldness and memorable scenes and reworked it to do the same things 100 years later. This movie is not for everyone: it is scary in a way some may love, while others may not.
Personally, “Nosferatu” was memorable in a way a movie hasn’t been for me in a shockingly long time, and I can’t give it enough praise.
The darkness really made this movie shine through.
