arguably nosferatu is a fable — in the way that almost all cultures have fables about monsters in the water, and tragedies that befall the people who run afoul of them. the cultural purpose of these fables is to instill in children a fear of water, and keep them from drowning. the target audience of nosferatu is not children, but women (and girls), and the thing it’s teaching them to fear is their own sexualities. don’t express that you want sex, don’t even think about it in the privacy of your own mind, because you might arouse the attention of a dangerous man. this movie is by far not the only thing in our culture that instills this fear in women, and i understand why — there is some reality to the need to warn women away from sex. but ultimately, women’s best self actualization requires confronting these fears along with the reality of their own sexualities, and knowing their strength to deal with the dangers.
the choice to have ellen die at the end felt less interesting than if she had found a way to survive. with her death, the movie says “yes, women should be afraid of their sexualities.” it says “yes, it is women’s responsibility to have sex that scares them with violent men, and ultimately to sacrifice themselves, to remove violence from society in general.” it’s a tragedy that upholds the mainstream messaging about women’s sexuality, nothing transgressive. (compare to the original ending of Get Out, where the cop car pulls up and it’s an actual cop. the decision to change this, to have chris survive while still emphasizing how dangerous the world is to him, was a subversive creative choice, and i agree with jordan peele that it was the right one for the movie. if only robert eggers had had equal insight.)
my favorite part of the movie was when ellen moved from “paralyzed by fear” to “do it scared” mode. i do think the end of the movie should have been a night of terror for her, where she defeats dracula at great personal cost. the horror would be about how society leaves women alone to contend with dangerous forces. instead we got this fairly lame “women have sexual power over men and can wield it, but doing so inevitably dooms them too, and that’s just how it has to be” ending. so that’s cool.
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