I really wanted to love Nosferatu. Supernatural thrillers, which I’d qualify it as over horror, have always been like a novelty to me. It’s interesting to consider otherworldly elements that could be real or lurking somewhere, like with Sleepy Hollow, Signs, or Donnie Darko. Yet despite Nosferatu starring Willem Dafoe, Lily-Rose Depp, Nicholas Hoult, Bill Skarsgård, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson — names on my Bingo Card for a dream dinner party — something fell flat. I could appreciate filmmaker Robert Eggers’ ability to conjure a chilling atmosphere through gothic hues and the constant low hum of dread. It’s definitely cryptic and unsettling. But its lack of character development and utterly serious tone almost made it comedic to watch.
Nosferatu is a stalker love story that dissects what lurks in the shadows, literally and within us. We land in 1838, in the fictional German town of Wisborg, where freshly-married couple Thomas (Hoult) and Ellen (Depp) are beginning their life together. To earn money for their future, estate agent Thomas embarks on a journey to the Carpathian Mountains. Waiting for him is an in-person signature from a client named Count Orlok (Skarsgård). Little does Thomas know — despite his shadowy buyer having talons, grey skin, mystical movements, and a sneering low-guttural voice — he’s invited himself into the den of a vampire. With no gimmicky garlic or holy crosses to protect him, Thomas is relegated to a feed bag for the Count, who is all the while infatuated with Thomas’s wife Ellen.
Back in Wisborg, Ellen is plagued by lusty dreams and bodily convulsions that all stem from Orlok, terrifying her and Thomas’s friends Friedrich (Taylor-Johnson) and Anna (Emma Corrin). Until Thomas can return, they shackle Ellen to a bed and drug her, ignoring her pleas that she’s had these nightmares since puberty. Soon enough, though, the friends must enlist the help of a disgraced professor (Dafoe) who’s studied the supernatural. He’s immediately shocked that no one else has seen Ellen’s situation for what it is: “Can’t you see? She is cursed!” He also realizes that the “evil” that rages inside her will soon make its way to the city, leaving death and destruction in its wake.
It’s important to mention that none of this storyline is meant to be playful, but that’s exactly how it watches: it attempts to be so serious, so cold, that it ends up just feeling silly. Why should we care about any of these characters in the first place? How can we not crack a smile at Skarsgård’s drawn-out monologues and unserious mustache? What’s with the theatrical pigeon-eating? (You’ll have to see it to understand that one.)
It could be, too, that Nosferatu just wasn’t a film that moved me. It has won over plenty of audiences, especially those with knowledge of Eggers from the likes of The Witch (2015). And don’t get me wrong: I’d still see it again for Depp’s beautiful performance or to appreciate the snowy views during Hoult’s journey. I just might be stifling a yawn or a laugh.
Movie Times: Click Here
Genre: Horror
Director: Robert Eggers
Actors: Emma Corrin, Willem Dafoe, Lily-Rose Depp, Nicholas Hoult, Bill Skarsgård, Aaron Taylor-Johnson
Run Time: 132 min
Rating: R for Bloody Violence, Graphic Nudity, and Some Sexual Content
