Nosferatu Review

A film based on a film based on a book, Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu has been highly anticipated since it was first announced. The director brings his singular style to this twisted tale of love, death, and obsession, resulting in a compelling, if not faultless, interpretation.

Visually, Nosferatu is stunning. From wide, beautifully symmetrical frames to incredibly smooth moving shots, the level of care put into the cinematography is striking. The sets, too, are excellent, those that have a griminess to them viscerally off-putting while the comfortable house of the well-off Hardings is ripe for exploration. A special consideration must be given to the costumes, many of which feature startlingly large sleeves and all of which will certainly inspire numerous mood boards. The more direct ‘horror’ aspects of the film feel a little out of place. Ellen Hutter’s (Lily Rose-Depp) Exorcist-like episodes are derivative and tend to be too long drawn out. Similarly, the ittedly few moments of gore are unnecessary. While minimal, scenes including a pigeon’s head being bitten off almost minimise the scariness of proceedings.

Count Orlok, Nosferatu himself, is rarely seen in his totality. Instead, we’re given a glance of a hand, a silhouette, a face in profile. Like Jaws, Nosferatu knows that not showing the threat and leaving the audience’s imagination to run wild can create a far more frightening creature. When Orlok (an unrecognisable Bill Skarsgard) is seen in full, it’s almost a disappointment. Stronger moments of visual horror come from the film’s embrace of cartoonishness. In one scene, a giant, clawed hand of shadow reaches across the city; in another, we see Count Orlok’s castle, a dark fairytale-like building that wouldn’t be out of place in a comic book. It’s a nice contrast to the more tangible human drama and meets the balance created by the narrative.

The production, despite its heavy story of obsession and death, has a humour to it. Aaron Taylor Johnson offers some straight-man relief to events as Friedrich Harding, a friend of the family dragged into a world of vampires and demons that he tries to disbelieve, while Willem Dafoe is hugely entertaining as eccentric scientist Professor Albin Eberhart Von Franz. Amid it all, Nicholas Hoult shines in his second Dracula-adjacent performance as leading man Thomas Hutter. At first a somewhat witless character far too committed to his job, later a romantic hero battling an unimaginable evil, Hoult is magnetic. Whether leaning into the comic, dramatic, or horror tilts of the story, he brings depth to a film that at times risks tipping into style over substance. On the other hand, the acting of Harding and his wife Anna’s (Emma Corrin) children is jarringly bad, begging the question of whether they were some kind of nepo hires. Immediately pulling the tension out of their scenes, the two girls are an unfortunate reminder of how few children can act.

At times, it feels as though Eggers is trying to put a ‘feminist’ twist on the story. Ellen is dismissed as a ‘hysterical woman’, her mental strife dismissed by her husband, friend, and doctors. Yet she fights back against the men around her, affirming her agency and going toe-to-toe with Harding and his lack of belief. In many ways, she’s a powerful character. However, all of this is undermined by the sexual politics of the narrative. Ellen is haunted by Nosferatu insists on the pair’s similarities, and the film’s eagerness to conflate sex and vampirism

The message is clear: if a woman has sexual desires, especially outside of marriage, she must be punished for them. The contrast is stark when Ellen’s turmoil is compared to Hutter’s reaction to Harding’s news of another child on the way: “You always were a rutting goat”. It’s a shame; there’s so much to be said about the intersection between vampires and sexuality, but Eggers says almost none of it. The theme is never really addressed, instead danced around in favour of atmospheric visuals, and the film ends without having made any kind of interesting statement.

Regardless of its faults, Nosferatu is an entertaining watch and a visual smorgasbord. Strong performances, beautiful design, and hypnotic camerawork can cover a myriad of faults; a worthy addition to Eggers’ oeuvre.

★★★★

In UK cinemas January 1st / Bill Skarsgard, Nicholas Hoult, Lily-Rose Depp, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Emma Corrin, Ralph Ineson, Simon McBurney, Willem Dafoe / Dir: Robert Eggers / Universal Pictures / 15