TAGGED AS: Horror, movies, vampires
Ready for vampires to be scary again? After what feels like an eternity in development, Count Orlok is finally about to return to our screens in Nosferatu. A remake of the 1922 film of the same name that retells the story of Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula, Robert Eggers’ next horror film hopes to be an actually scary vampire movie, and based on what we know, chances are likely that it succeeds.
Before you listen to the children of the night and the music they make, here is what we know about Nosferatu.
(Photo by Aidan Monaghan/©Focus Features)
Nosferatu is scheduled to be released by Focus Features in theaters nationwide on December 25, 2024. That’s right, Christmas day. What better way to spend the holidays than by watching a gothic tale of love, sacrifice, and lots of blood and terror? In the dark of winter, in the cold and isolation, that’s where he strikes. The vampyr. The Nosferatu.
(Photo by Aidan Monaghan/©Focus Features)
Robert Eggers has spent years trying to make his dream project, Nosferatu. Decades, even. In fact, he first announced that he was working on the remake after the premiere of The Witch back in 2015. But there have been many delays, and in that time, Eggers has continued making period pieces like The Lighthouse and The Northman. His ability to meticulously recreate the past and focus on the smallest details to immerse audiences in those worlds makes his obsession with Nosferatu intriguing and a winning combination. Eggers is a master of atmosphere, and vampire movies are nothing but drenched in atmosphere.
(Photo by Aidan Monaghan/©Focus Features)
When Nosferatu was first announced, Eggers envisioned a reunion with his The Witch star Anya Taylor-Joy, who would have taken the leading role, but when her scheduling didn’t work, she dropped out and Lily-Rose Depp was cast as Ellen Hutter. Still, fans of The Witch should keep an eye out for Ralph Ineson, who reunited with Eggers and will play Dr. Wilhelm Sievers. Nicholas Hoult plays Ellen’s husband, Thomas Hutter. Aaron Taylor-Johnson is set to play Thomas’ friend and German ship merchant Friedrich Harding, while Emma Corrin plays Friedrich’s wife, Anna. Also reuniting with Eggers is The Lighthouse co-star Willem Dafoe, who is set to play eccentric vampire hunter Professor Albin Eberhart von Franz.
(Photo by ©Focus Features)
Rounding out the cast is Bill Skarsgård as the titular vampire, Count Orlok himself. Speaking with Esquire about his take on the character, Skarsgård described Orlok as “gross” but also “very sexualized.” According to the actor, his goal is for the audience to “get a little bit attracted by it and disgusted by your attraction at the same time.”
(Photo by Aidan Monaghan/©Focus Features)
Nosferatu is a remake of F. W. Murnau’s 1922 expressionist film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, itself an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula. The film follows a vampire preying on the wife of his estate agent, as he seeks to buy a house near them. He also brings a plague to the town.
Being unauthorized, the film changed many names and details from the original novel, like Dracula being renamed Orlok, and it skips over large sections of the novel. Despite the changes, Murnau was sued by Stoker’s heirs and most of the copies of Nosferatu were destroyed.
(Photo by Aidan Monaghan/©Focus Features)
As for Eggers’ take on the film, Nosferatu is described as a gothic tale of obsession between a haunted woman and the terrifying monster infatuated with her in 19th-century Germany. Given Eggers’ history with period pieces, particularly his focus on themes of control and agency, of characters manipulated by external forces only to discover that they themselves hold the key to their fate, he is tailor-made for a vampire movie. The filmmaker’s obsession with period accuracy (down to the way people talk) and knack for practical imagery (down to shooting a scene featuring 2,000 real rats) points to Nosferatu being the kind of horror movie to creep inside your nightmares in the deep cold and dark of winter. The original Nosferatu made vampires scary, and every subsequent attempt at doing the same has paid homage to Murnau’s film — including, of course, Werner Herzog’s own 1979 remake, Nosferatu the Vampyre — so it’s appropriate that the director who gave us A24’s first moody horror film will bring the scary vampire back in modern times.
Yes, there is! The first trailer for Nosferatu is appropriately moody and light on plot details. We don’t even get to see the titular Count Orlok in detail, but we do see plenty of disturbing and creepy imagery that sells the expressionist and gothic influence on Eggers’ remake.
Nosferatu
(2024)
opens in theaters on December 25, 2024.
