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Visual Look

The visual look of this movie in one word would be oppressive. It evokes a sense of suppressed paranoia that only builds over time. The colors are depressed, borderline black and white. When there is light in the frame, almost exclusively a strong directional light like a torch or daytime sun, only diffused by snow or overcast weather and it dominates the frame. The light sources are heavily directional especially In indoor shots and overbearing to great effect. There are a couple indoor sequences at night where the fireplace or torch pervades the screen as if it is an inversion of the void on screen. This look is enhanced by the dust and other visual noise like the camera quality that, if not actually shot on film certainly evokes that impression.

Another subtle way the paranoia of Nosferatu is communicated is through shot composition choices. I first noticed the numerous long shots not just for setting the scene but to emphasize the smallness of the subject. The subjects are almost always center-lower frame. Thomas (played by Nicholas Hoult) is framed as a small miniature against the crossroads in the forest, losing himself already to a hazy delusion. Or Ellen (Lily-Rose Depp) similarly framed against the backdrop of her childhood home as she is supernaturally seduced by the monster. These shots serve to dwarf the subject in their environment and make them literally small against their surroundings.

At the same time the film never really falls into the shot reverse shot rhythm for conversations. Instead the camera begins in one frame and travels through the conversation on screen and the movement of characters within their physical environment where the viewer finds themselves at the next shot. This is no more evident as the ensemble conversation after Thomas has returned to Germany and the doctor explains his theory. The camera floats through the space, following Willem Dafoe’s Professor Albin Eberhart Von Franz. At any time one could pause and feasibly suspect that the shot was locked off and framed however unpausing would reveal that the camera is in constant motion. This impressed on me a sense of naturalism that counterbalanced the more supernatural elements that could have fallen prey to over drama or cheeseballness

There is also a great use of hidden cuts to create the illusion of long winding shots that descend into madness. There are two moments that mark the shift from the real world and into or out of delusion to great effect. The night Thomas wakes up after second having his blood drank at the Counts mantle the camera pans, a wide shot of Thomas lying on the ground, as he rises and walks to the door camera right. The camera appears to move from a handheld rig to a locked off tripod or other device, losing for a moment Thomas only for him to reenter as if the camera got ahead of him. This could have allowed the team to hide a cut wherein they had to change locations or costumes but it also serves to jar the audience out of the trance state Thomas was just in. 

These slow moving shots and wide isolating frames are best contrasted with the monster himself and his role in the frame. The camera almost avoids him, leaving much to the imagination spurned to overdrive with the haunting sound of Nosferatu’s guttural stuttering breathing. We don’t get a good look at Nosferatu, not until the end when he is thoroughly defanged. Until that moment he is obscured by framing or focus. The camera does not allow us a good look but the Count is always hovering in the extreme foreground or background until Thomas cuts his finger, only then do we get an extreme close up of his eyes. Those moments in the castle in Transylvania are lost to quick cuts and close up shots that disorient the viewer and Thomas by withholding important, orienting information.

Nosferatu

The titular Nosferatu could have been silly or cheesy but given that this is a character that is the source of so many of the vampire tropes they do a very good job committing to the accent and visual motifs without tripping into cheeseball territory. Nosferatu is genuinely gross and repulsive and scary. His voice drags through the lines intermingled with his guttural breathing, booming and nerve-wracking. It dominates the soundscape, invading Ellen and Thomas’ trance states and melding with the real world at opportune times. He also is very dead. Worm eaten and decaying, he is truly the living dead.

VFX

Some moments I noticed had to do with fire and shadows. Most of the shots containing fire appear to have real fire but there are a couple that seem to have been added in post. This isn’t to say the fire looks bad because it doesn’t; the stylization in these moments make it appear to have been filmed on actual film with the fire backlit and drawn on. Nosferatu’s shadow takes a role in this movie in that it almost feels like a living thing. The shadow of his hand floats through the frame in sharp detail. It feels foreboding and is honestly just cool. Otherwise any other visual effects are imperceptive or irrelevant. They serve the story rather than distract.

Movie monsters and the Plague

The original 1922 film, steeped in the occult from thematic elements to the production team, oozes into our present in this 2024 remake. Strong themes of the occult, of pestilence and indescribable violence and violation are as present in the original as they are in this remake and their audiences a century apart are not as disparate as one would think.

Monsters have always stood for something; some fear in society. These films so far apart in their production reflect similarities that should be remarked on. The 1922 film was produced through a myriad of post world war 1 German fears and rationalizations; the inconceivable war, the need to order it into something understandable and killable. Controlled through story so it may be vanquished for our comfort.

It would be remiss not to mention the suggestions of antisemitism present in the original Nosferatu though it seems baked into the times more than any motivated director or enterprising actor. The modern take does not confront those implications, nor does it indulge them. A lawyer is a lawyer, a count is a count. 

As this movie was release at the end of 2024 only scant years after our own global pandemic, the monster and his ensuing black plague take on a different role of fear. It is not necessarily a fear of the invading other and those traitors hidden in our midst (though I see that reading and do not disagree).

Nosferatu is, in my perception, not a jewish stereotype in this modern retelling but the undead visage of our most uncontrollable motions. Loneliness, disability, the lack of control as it seems society devolves around you and its banality. We are just as entrenched in the occult as we might have been in 1920’s Germany though now we call it conspiracy, politics, the internet. Subcultures that have taken on a life of their own in a way that terrifies us all though for all different reasons; we are all terrified we cannot control it.

And so, in Nosferatu we can reclaim some of that control and kill the beast; countering some of their occult methodologies with our own ritualistic reply. Sacrifice the virgin and the monster can be vanquished, we will be free of this pestilence and mass delusion.

Sex and Impulse

Many moments of deep fear, pain, and violation are backlit by the sounds or motions of sex, however this feels less like a condemnation of (particularly) female promiscuity as is so common and more a corruption of something good; the sweet affection of two young lovers, of moving on and trying to find something good only for your old haunts to resurge and ruin what you’ve found.

I mourn when Thomas, in his desperation and fear of his possessed wife takes to her violently, a spell they both seem relieved of moments later. Their love is evident, if not in the script than in soft look and touch. It renders that moment of mutual sexual violence all the more tragic. It is painful.

In conversation with that is the emphasis, from Nosferatu himself, as an urge, a hunger. He is a need or a force, not a man swayed by rational thinking. It taps into something all of us feel, the irrationality of desire whether that be sex or hunger or want for something that you cannot reach. Violence and the anger necessary to commit it.It is something baseless and yet so base that it can motivate us, people, to do horrible things. Can you see how this might be in conversation with a post World War One Germany? However, its themes remain timeless.

Actors and Acting

If I had one gripe about this movie it is Aaron Tayor-Johnson. Not because of anything he did but because I just saw Kraven and could only see those parts of his performance. Perhaps in a couple years when I have forgotten that snoozefest of a movie I will be able to watch his performance here with more clarity. That being said I think he does do a great job as Friedrich Harding. Also the only guy reacting normally in this damn house (forgive me Thomas but you were indisposed hanging out with the nuns). In the meantime though, take more weird roles Aaron Taylor Johnson!

Lily-Rose Depp is amazing to watch as is her lanky co-star Nicholas Hoult. Both have haunting cheekbones that make them lovely for distraught victorian germans. I also just watched Nicholas Hoult in Juror #2 which primed me nicely for his subtle performances of dawning horror in Nosferatu. Willem Dafoe, born in the wrong time, was made for this kind of role as the occult philosopher. He manages to bring an aloof, slightly comedic air to the screen that livens up the story. Everyone else, awesome no notes from me.

Overall I would recommend this movie and for it to be watched closely as it rewards the careful viewer.