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Manila Bulletin devider Entertainment devider Celebrities devider The re-virgin bride: A review of 'Nosferatu'

The re-virgin bride: A review of 'Nosferatu'

Published Feb 23, 2025 05:39 am

At A Glance

  • The film has garnered four nominations for the upcoming 97th Academy Awards for Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Production Design, and Best in Make-Up and Hair-Styling.
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A scene from 'Nosferatu'

A remake of the 1922 film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, directed by F. W. Murnau, this 2024 Robert Eggers’ "Nosferatu" is a passion project for the auteur director, who is known for The Witch, The Lighthouse, and The Northman. It’s a respectful remake, and for trivia, it’s worth knowing that the 1922 film was an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula novel of 1897.

A Gothic melodrama, this 2024 Nosferatu is creepy and atmospheric. It starts strongly with a dream sequence that immediately introduces us to Ellen (Lily-Rose Depp) and the start of the bizarre and macabre relationship she has with Count Orlok/Nosferatu (Bill Skarsgärd, who was Pennywise in It). It’s a psychic connection over distance, with physical fruition promised sometime in the future when she has to give herself willingly to the Count.

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When she marries real estate agent Thomas Hutter (Nicholas Hoult), he is soon thrust into a deadly game of dominance and mind control, with Count Orlok having a distinct advantage. This is helped in no small part by the fact that Hutter’s boss, the devious Mr. Knock (Simon McBurney), is the Count’s ‘familiar.’

Willem Dafoe and Ralph Ineson also play major roles, and they’re firmly part of the Eggers family, as the two have now been cast in three of the four Eggers film credits. Dafoe portrays Dr. Von Franz, the character that would most closely resemble that of Van Helsing in Stoker’s Dracula. Ineson is Dr. Sievers, the doctor who was first called to treat Ellen but did so using conventional medicine.

The film has garnered four nominations for the upcoming 97th Academy Awards for Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Production Design, and Best in Make-Up and Hair-Styling. It has won Best Cinematography in the Critics Choice Awards, plus other award shows, with Jarin Blaschke going up to the podium.

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It runs for over two hours, but it’s paced rather well, with the scenes offering sensuous, repulsive, suspenseful, and terrifying in equal measures. Shot in Prague, trained rats were also used in the film. If there is a drawback in the narrative, it would be that we’re not given enough to care for any of the main protagonists honestly, so while we are ready to follow the events and are curious about what happens next, we’re not invested in them.

"Nosferatu" opens in cinemas on Feb. 26; the cinematography alone is worth the watch. 

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