“Nosferatu” is a gothic nightmare best seen on the big screen

The best horror movie of the year waited until Christmas Day to release, and it was worth the wait.  “Nosferatu” is an intensely thrilling feat, perfectly dark and dour for the depths of winter ahead of us.  It is a time when the foliage dies and the skies are grey for weeks on end.  Times when the nights get longer and start earlier.  Times when the cold wakes you sharply.  In his film, director and writer Robert Eggers has transformed these feelings into a cinematic experience of the highest caliber.

There’s nothing uncommon about another tale about vampires, but to remake one of the earliest of all horror movies is to approach filmmaking sacrilege.  Even if “Nosferatu” has its origins as an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s “Dracula,” the 1922 silent film is monumental in utilizing the gothic shadows of German expressionism to solidify the aesthetic blueprint for practically every addition to the vampire subgenre since, if not the entirety of the horror genre.  Yet here, with tremendous confidence and an unwavering eye for the macabre, Eggers directs a tremendous ensemble of performers and leads a legion of talented craftsmen in delivering top-notch work.  The resulting collaboration honors the original while still succeeding as a modern retelling of characters facing evil incarnate.

Ignoring rules of logic and tangibility, the vampire Orlok (Bill Skarsgård) penetrates all aspects of the film.  Already the ancient monster has decided on Ellen Hutter (Lily-Rose Depp) as his eternal wife to be, and Eggers follows the beats of previous vampire films to show his plan to infiltrate her life in 19th century Germany.  It involves inviting her husband Thomas (Nicholas Hoult) to his castle to sell him a new house in town.  Though Ellen warns of deadly omens, her pleas fall on deaf ears.

As Thomas journeys to the castle, the dark atmosphere ramps up.  In particular is the gorgeous cinematography by Eggers’ frequent collaborator Jarin Blaschk, who captures the hopelessness of the nights as near-black-and-white.  His camera follows Thomas the way that you imagine moving in a nightmare, dipping in-and-out of the shadows to reveal dimly lit rooms where Orlok moves without earthly restraints.  As the monster speaks, Skarsgård’s voice is amplified in the sound mix, overpowering all other noises to petrify the characters where they stand.  He is unrecognizable as Orlok, buried under grotesque makeup and a thick Romanian accent that allows him to shine in yet another monstrous role.

When Orlok does come to town, his evil influence brings a plague that sends everyone into a panic.  In the center of the chaos is poor Ellen, who suffers possessions that friends and doctors write off as lunacy.  While we never quite reach a beacon of hope, the disgraced Professor von Franz (Willem Dafoe) has better answers than anyone else.  He knows that science cannot explain what his eyes have seen.  Why else do people turn away from facts if not because they’re terrified of them?

Each actor supplies a performance that ranks among their finest, but above them all is Depp.  As the object of Orlok’s eye, her character is nicely expanded upon from the 1922 original.  The tortured heart of the film, her portrayal of Ellen is the type of performance that people forget is make believe.  The fated relationship between her and the vampire is explored through carnal, sexual imagery that highlights the dread at hand while suggesting a fate worse than death.  Viewers may write some of it off as camera tricks and makeup, but underneath it all is a very physical performance.  As with many horror movies, the female perspective is key; this is a woman facing eternity with a monster, living in as oppressive a time as ever.  She carries a melancholy that, sadly, many women may relate to today.

The plot keeps no secrets from the audience, and the film is able to bask in the dread at a steady pace because of it.  Characters walk alone in unbroken shots that keep us searching for the evil happening just outside of the frame.  We feel their stress as they speak to the camera head-on with period-accurate dialogue, lending an extra bit of gravitas that invites us further in.  This level of suspense is kept up throughout the entire length, and by the end you feel the cumulative effect.  Without Depp it’d feel tortuous, but with her willing to stand up and face the darkness, we stay willing as well.

In less than 10 years, Eggers has overseen a filmography that includes “The Witch,” “The Lighthouse,” “The Northman,” and now this.  The list of filmmakers who can maintain as consistent a level of quality is short, and the list of those who are able to dodge studio compromise for that many features is even shorter.  It is more than refreshing to see an epic vision such as this be fully realized, and the producers behind “Nosferatu” deserve praise for their trust in the artistic process.  Films like this inspire confidence in the moviegoing experience.  Anyone who is a fan of horror cannot miss this one in theaters.