In 1838 Germany, a newlywed couple is planning their hopeful future despite the distressing problem that the lovely young bride is haunted by visions. Ellen (Lily-Rose Depp) remembers horrid yet pleasurable dreams of being wedded to some sort of demon, surrounded by a wedding party of the dead. Not exactly what earnest husband Thomas (Nicolas Hoult) wants to hear, but things have seemed to be getting better once they married (without corpses in attendance).
In an effort to improve his standing at the firm where he has just started working, Thomas takes an assignment to sign over a real estate deed to one Count Orlok. However, his boss claims, it must be done in person. Thomas will have to journey to wayyyy over here on the map to Orlok’s castle in the distant Carpathian Mountains. He hesitates leaving Ellen in such a fragile state, but knows that this job will have great returns. So off he goes on his horse at full trot, with Ellen staying with their wealthy dear friends Friedrich (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Anna (Emma Corrin).
After an encounter with a local Romani village (where even without a common language, Thomas starts to realize the whole trip to the Count’s castle may be a very bad idea), Thomas finds himself sharing a table with a restless and mysterious Orlok (Bill Skarsgaard). Let’s just say Nicolas Hoult forgets any vampire wrangling skills from his turn in Vampire’s Apprentice as his Thomas spends much of his time paralyzed in fright in the Count’s creepy presence. After the first night, Thomas can’t seem to escape, tries unsuccessfully to kill the Count as he sleeps in his crypt during the day, and ends up finally tumbling into a frozen river. But not before the poor guy has signed some contract with the Count that of course he can’t read.
Meanwhile, Ellen’s visions return. She’s sleepwalking, feverish, having nightmares, and writhing erotically in her bed. Her hosts are aghast, and the summoned doctor hesitantly recommends getting the help of his old mentor, one Albin Eberhart Von Franz (Willem Dafoe), a man who was shunned by the medical community for his interest and belief in the occult. While Thomas makes his way back to Ellen, and Count Orlok makes his own way to Germany to the young woman that he claims summoned him, all things go from bad to worse with Ellen and friends.
It must be said that Nosferatu looks amazing. Director Robert Eggers again shows his flair for the visual in this stylish gothic tale. Like his other films, any shot could be framed, and at points it almost feels like a black and white film. Eggers is easily one of the most interesting visual filmmakers working today (check out his amazing and strange The Lighthouse to see why I’ll watch anything he makes).
Count Orlok is by far one of the film’s best chilling effects, with his low, guttural voice that sounds like timber tumbling off a logging truck deep in the misty mountains. Eggers only teases glimpses of the Count at first, which is extremely effective when you see Orlok’s looming cloaked figure as a shadow behind a curtain in Ellen’s window. Unrecognizable from his memorable Pennywise character, Bill Sarsgaard as Orlok is a menacing, towering figure with his thick Slavic moustache and rotting skin, a look of death and decay reflected by the extinct Dacian language that rumbles from his core. When he drinks blood from his victims, it sounds like someone biting into a crisp apple then chugging a gallon of orange juice next to the fridge on a midnight snack run. Yikes.
Considering how often gruesome and squishy and wet the whole happenings become, the cast is game, though honestly most of the characters don’t make much of a deep impression. Emma Corrin as Ellen’s supportive and doomed friend manages to lend her character some gravitas despite her minimal screen time, and Willem Dafoe brings a surprising (or maybe not?) amount of camp to the proceedings. In fact, much of Nosferatu is kind of funny between the plague and and the gore, and I can only hope that was on purpose.
But Nosferatu still left me feeling kind of empty. The film is more mood than downright dread or horror, which is fine—but like most films these days, the film is simply too long (this is despite the fact the editing and character development felt weirdly rushed, like Thomas’ time at the castle seemed haphazardly cut and confusing). Nosferatu definitely feels like Eggers’ passion project (apparently he started developing it in 2015), and it definitely feels like one of those movies where an acclaimed director got free reign where a suggestion or more may have improved the final cut. I can’t help but think that if it lost half an hour of runtime and got a re-edit, it could be (and should be) a better film than it is.
