The Witch director Robert Eggers’ homage to the seminal German Expressionist masterpiece Nosferatu, this entry into the folk horror canon is an always-stunning, blood-curdling, beautifully discomfiting film that’s more than worthy of its predecessor.
Through his films, Eggers has consistently demonstrated his love for the history and artistry of cinema, and Nosferatu is an oeuvre that encapsulates both the genuine horror of the 1922 film by F.W. Murnau and the tragic Romanticism of the Dracula lore, all while boldly trekking into the landscape of female sexual psyche. Not only does this film honour its forbearers in its beauty, it invigorates this Gothic tale with a distinctly modern thematic twist.
In the 1830s, estate agent Thomas Hutter (Nicholas Hoult) travels to the Carpathian Mountains for an unnerving meeting with the mysterious Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgård), a haunting presence dipped in shadow who lurks at the edge of the frame for much of the film. In his absence, Hutter’s new bride, Ellen (Lily-Rose Depp in an Oscar-worthy performance), is left under the care of their friends, Friedrich and Anna Harding (Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Emma Corrin). Assailed by horrific visions, bouts of somnambulism and fits, and plagued by a growing sense of dread, Ellen soon spirals out of hers, or anyone’s, control.
Nosferatu is a welcome return to, and celebration of, the long-established connection between vampires and feminine identity and its providing a means of tackling the shame and taboos surrounding women’s historic sexual oppression. This is unequivocally Ellen’s story, about the quieter struggle of internalised self-hatred and desire, or of women’s eternal battle existing within the Madonna-Whore complex. Eggers’ work recognises why vampire stories have so long called to women; Their power is in how it allows us to accept and admire, even just for a moment, some of the most socially unacceptable parts of ourselves. Simultaneously however, Ellen’s relationships with Count Orlok and Thomas recognises the ways in which women are conditioned to accept love in whatever diminished quantity and quality that they can receive it, and will sometimes reject love they don’t believe themselves worthy of.
The story exists within that fundamental conflict between Ellen’s desire and shame. The tension between the perceived destruction she wreaks when she holds agency and her powerlessness in the face of limited choices is ever-engrossing, while her fight to reclaim her autonomy and self-worth is what drives Nosferatu onwards to a haunting, devastating climax that’s equal parts Greek tragedy, Romantic Epic, and raw horror. Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu is a masterpiece on every level: it’s an exquisitely realised artistic vision, a story that’s beautifully brutal and harrowing, and an unapologetically feminist iteration of the vampire lore.
Nosferatu releases in UK cinemas on January 1st, 2025.
