Nosferatu review: This creepy and compelling new take on vampire myth is a thing of beauty
Robert Eggers's film is a triumphant, visually resplendent horror that will leave you clutching the arms of your chair in sheer terror.
Focus Features
- James Mottram
★★★★☆
Nosferatu will be in cinemas from New Year's Day 2025. Add it to your watchlist
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The classic vampire tale, Nosferatu has haunted generations, right back to the 1922 silent film starring Max Schreck as the bloodsucking Count Orlok.
Itself a loose adaptation of Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula, the seminal horror by FW Murnau inspired filmmakers again and again, including Werner Herzog, who made 1979’s Nosferatu the Vampyre. Now comes the turn of Robert Eggers, the visionary director behind oddball sea shanty The Lighthouse (2019) and Viking saga The Northman (2022).
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No question, Eggers’s Nosferatu is a thing of beauty. Faithfully retelling the story, as a young real estate broker comes face-to-face with Orlok in his gloomy Transylvanian castle, there probably isn’t a horror movie that’s looked more ravishing.
Even Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 film Bram Stoker’s Dracula pales next to this work of art, a film that plays with light and shadow in such a compelling manner. Creepy and compelling, Eggers’s take on the vampire myth keeps you transfixed from the very opening to the haunting finale.
Nicholas Hoult plays Thomas Hutter, a young man sent by his company to meet with Orlok (Bill Skarsgård), who is looking to do business. Hutter leaves behind his young wife Ellen (Lily-Rose Depp), who remains with her best friend Anna Harding (Emma Corrin) and Anna’s husband, Friedrich (Aaron Taylor-Johnson).
Nicholas Hoult as Thomas Hutter in Nosferatu. Focus Features
When Hutter arrives at the village where Orlok lives, he finds the locals terrified, warning him to abandon his journey. Undeterred, he meets with Orlok, but he’s left trapped in the castle as the Count travels to Germany to prey on Hutter’s wife. As if nodding to another horror classic, Eggers also casts the venerable Willem Dafoe, who previously played the lead in the sublime Shadow of the Vampire (2000). Here, he plays Professor Albin Eberhart Von Franz, an expert in the occult and mysticism able to comprehend the curious psychic connection between Orlok and Ellen.
Also in the cast, British actor Ralph Ineson – who starred in Eggers’s eerie 2015 debut, folk horror The Witch – appears as Dr Wilhelm Sievers, the medic instructed to treat the ailing Ellen.
Willem Dafoe as Prof. Albin Eberhart Von Franz in Nosferatu. Focus Features
At its black heart is a terrific performance from Skarsgård, who has made something of a career out of scaring the pants off audiences – from his Pennywise the Clown in the two-part adaptation of Stephen King’s It to the 2022 breakout hit Barbarian.
Here, he’s almost unrecognisable, buried under a mountain of prosthetics, but he still delivers a chilling turn as a lonely figure driven to satisfy his carnal desires. The film ripples with sexual tension, as Ellen is left to fight for her very soul.
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Where Nosferatu really scores is in the fabulous look and feel of the film. Jarin Blaschke, who has shot all of Eggers’s features, conjures up something quite masterful here. The bleached look is drained of colour, allowing us to wallow in this nocturnal tale. Boasting a colour palette of blacks and midnight blues and silvery-moonlight, this version truly transports viewers into a gothic nightmare.
With an impressive score by Robin Carolan, the film also feels utterly authentic to its 19th-century milieu, with wonderfully tailored costumes from Linda Muir and production design by Craig Lathrop (with much of the film shot on soundstages in Prague). From the excellent support cast, Depp shines in one of her best performances to date, while Hoult is a sturdy presence as the husband desperate to save his beloved. Corrin and Taylor-Johnson somewhat take a backseat.
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But in the end, this is Eggers’s movie, and a triumphant, visually resplendent horror that is destined to shake up the awards season. An ominous work, it’ll leave you clutching the arms of your chair in sheer terror.
Authors
James Mottram
James Mottram is a London-based film critic, journalist, and author.
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