‘Nosferatu’ Review – Robert Eggers Reimagines A Classic Fable With Darkness, Desire, And Brilliance To Spare

In retrospect, it’s improbably fortunate that Robert Eggers was able to get his hands on F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror when he did. Though the German Expressionist masterpiece of unauthorized fame was released in 1922, just shy of exactly one decade after Bram Stoker’s death, all copies of the film were ordered to be destroyed after Stoker’s heirs sued Murnau and co. over their adaptation. (The film is officially considered a work inspired by Dracula, despite its many alterations, due to the original German intertitles that acknowledged Stoker’s novel as Nosferatu’s source material). Nevertheless, several prints of the film survived destruction and were thus bootlegged into oblivion, allowing its legacy to live on and, eventually, for a VHS tape “made from a poor 16mm print” to land in Eggers’ hands when he was just nine years old, according to a personal note that Eggers sent to members of the Critics Choice Association last week. He would go on to direct a stage production of Nosferatu while he was in high school, and to eventually “stage a more professional version” of the story at a local theatre in New Hampshire. This series of opportunities would serve as the inciting events for Eggers’ interest and eventual career in filmmaking; in more ways than one, we wouldn’t have The Witch, The Lighthouse, or The Northman without Nosferatu.

Of course, that’s a given. We wouldn’t have any filmmaker’s filmography without the thing that inspired them to become a filmmaker in the first place (thank goodness Steven Spielberg’s parents got divorced, etc.). But we hear far less about how significant a film can be in the fabric of the medium itself, especially when that film is Nosferatu and not The Birth of a Nation or Citizen Kane. While those pictures continue to serve as pillars in the history of cinema, it’s the horror genre at large that owes its very existence to Nosferatu. In the 2018 book “The Definitive Guide to Horror Movies” the critic and historian Kim Newman wrote that Murnau’s film “still stands as the only screen adaptation of Dracula to be primarily interested in terror… [it] added wrinkles to Stoker that have persisted, notably the vampire vanquished by the first light of day. Going further, Newman argued that Nosferatu “serves as the template for the horror film” itself, i.e. without it, we wouldn’t have the films and filmmakers who continuously attempt to broaden its horizons, even in vain.

It seems that Newman’s assertion may require some revisitation, as with his own film adaptation of Nosferatu – which will finally see the light of day on Christmas after residing in a developmental tomb for eight years – Eggers both realizes a lifelong dream and delivers an assured, dark reimagining of the iconic film that can stand beside its inspiration with pride, evading its lofty shadow to cast one of its own. Not only does it gorgeously broaden the literal horizons of Murnau’s original, with Craig Lathrop’s production design bringing the brick-laid architecture and muddy, rat-infested side streets of 19th Century Europe to life, but it serves as a crowning achievement in Eggers’ filmography, further proof that he is one of the most inspired filmmakers working today, no matter the genre. That he’s often turning in such stirring craftsmanship in the horror landscape, a realm continuously peppered by the lazy, persistent regurgitation of old tropes, is perhaps most exhilarating of all.

Just when this critic was becoming used to no longer being scared by modern horror cinema, Eggers waits not five minutes before deploying a moment that should jolt even the most stoic of moviegoers out of their seats. Sure, the typical jump scare might get hearts racing a bit faster than it would otherwise, but the tone that Nosferatu’s opening moments set for its remaining two-plus hours should be considered a menacing badge of honor for Eggers and his brother Max, with whom he co-wrote the script. Nosferatu’s prologue – and much of its runtime, for that matter – centers on a tortured young woman named Ellen Hutter (a revelatory Lily-Rose Depp), whispering into the wind for something to “come to [her],” to “hear [her] call.” Tearful and pained, Ellen begs for its presence, almost like a mourning child might call for a deceased elder after they’ve passed on. In this situation, however, it doesn’t appear that Ellen is doing this of her own accord. She begins to float as a shadow appears in the curtain, a strengthening breeze revealing more of its frame with every gust. Then, following a sudden cut, she is lying in a garden, a zombified hand around her neck, while the strings and a bellowing chorus from Robin Carolan’s score reach maximum volume as the title card appears, confirming what we already knew: Indeed, that hand belonged to Nosferatu, but not like you remember him before.

The details that form the rest of the film’s central plot are rather simple, though they craft an indelible nightmare that is as chilling as it can be procedural. Ellen’s husband, Thomas (Nicholas Hoult, capping off the best year of his career to date), is sent to Transylvania by his boss, Herr Knock (Simon McBurney), to see a new client. He’s called Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgård), and he’s hoping to purchase a home in the Hutter’s German village to live out the rest of his days. Given that Orlok, as Knock jokes, has “one foot in the grave,” it shouldn’t be too vexing a task, though it will require Thomas to take a six-week journey to Orlok’s current estate, a troubling notion for Ellen, as she’s only just recently gotten over her “fancies.” At least that’s what Thomas dubbed the nightmares that crippled her early on in their relationship, only being temporarily alleviated at the onset of the marriage, which Ellen assumed would rid her of her terrors for good. With the sake of her sanity in mind, Thomas and Ellen seek the assistance of their friends, Friedrich Harding (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and his wife Anna (Emma Corrin), who agree to let Ellen stay with them while Thomas travels. The group agrees that a change of scenery and consistent company should help dispel Ellen’s nightmares. If only it were so simple.

Cloaked in an overwhelming darkness, Nosferatu is ultimately a story about the agony of obsession, impeccably captured by Depp in a career-best performance. She suffers worsening spells of madness the longer her husband’s stay at Orlok’s castle continues, a blight that few can make sense of due to Nosferatu’s concealed nature. Fittingly, it takes a while for a clear image of Orlok to come into focus, but in his long-anticipated turn as the titular vampire, Bill Skarsgård is indeed unrecognizable, and even more startling than advertised. The craft that went into creating his zombified, ghoulish look is grotesquely exceptional, his claw-like hands looking eerily similar to those that Max Schreck’s Orlok wore in 1922, yet more authentic in appearance, the sort that you can imagine have held a winged bat moments before ripping its head off. Honestly, Skarsgård’s appearance is unlike anything that could have been imagined, especially considering the previous iterations that could have been viewed as influences. Instead, Skarsgård’s Orlok is, well, deader. He’s grayer, darker, bloodier, ghostlier, and altogether more terrifying and grim, his voice a booming echo and his incessant slurping a blood-curdling addition to an already-fascinating turn.

The character’s motivations are even more disturbing, and thus more curious to dissect. Orlok’s presence is that of a demented spirit, and whoever is unlucky enough to enter his orbit suddenly becomes stricken with an inescapable dread that either they or their loved ones will suffer from. In the case of the Hutters, Ellen is already too far gone, leaving Thomas as the vulnerable soul onto which Orlok can begin to feast. The worst part, it seems, is how omnipresent Nosferatu is, no matter if he’s hiding in the mountains of Transylvania or making his way through Germany. He collects minions, has them deliver the message that “he is coming,” and begins to take over his chosen locale like a plague. As one character observes, “He is infinity.”

Despite the everlasting torment that occasionally veers the picture into repetitive territory – “How many times can this vampire threaten this same woman and her husband?” you might wonder, the answer being “As many times as he’d like” – Nosferatu’s back half comes with revelations, none of which would necessarily qualify as spoilers, but should nonetheless be seen for themselves. Essentially, two warring minds – those of Dr. Wilhelm Sievers (Ralph Ineson) and his former professor, Albin Eberhart Von Franz (a delirious Willem Dafoe) – argue over what could be possessing poor Ellen, all while experiencing horrors and quasi-possessions of their own due to the brutality of her possessed state. Sievers is staunch in his position that she must just be sick, not possessed by some faraway vampire, while Von Franz knows of Nosferatu and fears what might become of their home should he find his way there. Befitting a Dafoe character in an Eggers film, Von Franz often does so hilariously, at one point invoking Isaac Newton in a description of how frightened they all should be of what is to come. (That, in fact, is too good a moment to spoil.)

If there is any fitting reference point for Eggers’ Nosferatu, it’s probably Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula as opposed to any of the many other post-Murnau vampiric tales. Werner Herzog’s 1979 film Nosferatu the Vampyre is more contemplative than terrifying; a trio of films from 2023 – The Last Voyage of the Demeter, Renfield, and El Conde – all seemed flustered by the weight of the iconic character’s aura. Demeter treated Dracula like an RPG video game’s most difficult boss; Renfield reduced the vampire to a horrible boss; El Conde, the best film of the three, turned him into Augusto Pinochet, the former Chilean dictator. (Although, fair enough.) An exceptional work in its own right, Coppola’s film was more curious in the occult aspect of Orlok’s influence on those in his orbit than it was in true terror. Nosferatu, meanwhile, balances both ideas, the terror that drifts with Orlok like a rain cloud over the heads of those who succumb to his darkness, and the occult possession he forces upon his unsuspecting targets.

Whether the attention to detail here is due to Eggers’ obsession with the material or merely his gifts as a filmmaker are ultimately two sides of the same coin. He continues to surround himself with expert craftsmen, Jarin Blaschke being foremost among them. The Oscar-nominated cinematographer has worked with Eggers on each of his four features, all of which have been period pieces, but Nosferatu is the most fully realized of the lot. The images these two madmen craft together might require some adjustment from your eyes, but once your pupils dilate and you become accustomed to the midnight blackness of the entire affair, you’ll meet your maker in the form of a film most interested in what the darkest parts of us desire and fear. That we can’t see either one – that is, until it’s too late – makes it all the more terrifying.