By Dolores Quintana
Claws encased in a velvet glove. The audience helplessly feels Death’s wings enveloping the characters. Robert Egger’s newest film Nosferatu is a commanding sensual seduction drawing us into evil’s embrace, made real by Robert Eggers’ dark powers and the 100% commitment of the cast and crew. You can buy tickets here and the film opens on Christmas Day. What better time?
Nosferatu is a gothic tale of obsession between a haunted young woman and the terrifying vampire infatuated with her, causing untold horror in its wake and the second remake of the black and white horror classic made by F.W. Murnau. It follows in the wild German footsteps of Werner Herzog’s chilling second version from 1979.
This film stars Bill Skarsgård, Nicholas Hoult, Lily-Rose Depp, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Emma Corrin, Ralph Ineson, and Willem Dafoe with Robert Eggers as the director and writer of the film. Eggars has been working on the project for many years since it was first announced in 2015.
You see all the familiar bones of the most familiar tale of the king vampire, as Nosferatu was an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula with a different name applied to it to dodge the estate of the Irish writer. The infamous Transylvanian nobleman is known as Count Orlok. If it seems similar to Dracula, it is, and it is because it is the same basic story, but differs in one crucial aspect.
The film is beautifully detailed in its period costumes and settings. Lit with candles and suffused in shadows, it creeps through the theatre, breathing on the back of your neck. It has distinct sexual and sensual aspects through the performances of the actors in the obsessions of those infected by the vampire, the tearing of flesh, the spilling of blood, and the ecstasy of possession. The sensuality and violence seemed wound together in a splendid coupling of two of the most passionate acts that humans are capable of.
Initially, Lily-Rose Depp’s performance did not seem complete to me. Her Ellen Hutter was fearsome, but not as vulnerable as the words of the script suggested. However, after a second viewing, I realized that it was a feature and not a bug. Ellen Hutter has a connection to Orlock and is different from most human beings. She has psychic talents and strangeness that are only diverted by her true love of her husband Thomas and her friendship with Anna Harding. She is a pure and powerful soul linked to a monster, not a monster herself, and one that returns to selflessness and goodness when in their presence. She is a flaming star that Orlock covets. Her arc has agency that other versions do not have. She is not the sacrificial lamb but wields power of her own.
I believe that the film’s heart is actually Thomas Hutter, as played by Nicolas Hoult. He is open fully emotionally and his fear is palpable. As usual, he is an astoundingly talented and vulnerable actor who gives his all. Emma Corrin, Aaron Taylor Johnson, Adéla Hesová, and Milena Konstantinova, as the Harding family, are another emotional anchor, particularly Taylor-Johnson’s and Corrin’s touching work. Ralph Ineson is a joy playing a caring playing a well-meaning sort for the time period. He always adds value to a cast.
Lily Rose-Depp is also 100% committed to the role and goes places few other actresses have gone before. Her Ellen is at once icy and fully capable of touching devotion, even if her motives and how she achieves her feats of love are not readily apparent to the eye. It’s a brave performance that goes against the submissiveness of previous adaptations. Because of the actors’ work and Eggers’ writing and direction, the film and characterizations are complex and fraught with human weaknesses and the wild and unknowable turns of the heart.
Bill Skarsgård is a masterful yet vulnerable demon. Under makeup and appliances, his talent shines through. The costume does not wear him. He takes the rotten flesh of the vampire and animates it with his soulful and sad presence. It is important to note that Eggers wanted to bring fear back to the vampire tale. While Noseratu has elements of gothic romance, it is horror and Skarsgård’s and Depp’s talents are what makes the fear real. Not fully feral, but nowhere near human, his power is intimidating and his presence is unnerving. He feels otherworldy and his attacks upon his victims are sensual no matter what sex they are.
Still, the film is not without tension relieving humor, but clearly it is a vampire film that has jettisoned the giggling “fair maiden in danger” aspect of other vampire films. Willem Dafoe’s Professor Albin Eberhart von Franz is the source of much of it, however he does not replay the admittedly entertaining canned ham of Anthony Hopkin’s performance in Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Professor von Franz may be driven mad by his studies, but he is serious yet crafty about his alchemy and his solution for the vampire plague.
The film’s score, set design, and especially the costumes are fantastic. The cinematography is steeped in darkness that becomes alive. It vibrates with free floating anxiety where it seems like there is never any sun. Only soft light blunted by fog and clouds, that bears down upon the characters relentlessly.
Nosferatu is a majestic addition to the alternative canon of the vampire. It is so beautifully constructed of screams and last gasps. Ethereal and bone freezing, it soars where other vampire films thud to the ground. It is a dark magic being projected onto the screen and perfect for Christmas.
