We really like Robert Eggers, so we were pretty psyched for Nosferatu (2024). It turned out to be an interesting and respectful approach to the material, but interesting enough? Too respectful?
Young Lily-Rose Depp is lonely, praying for a soul connection to a guardian angel, or who would always be by her side. Far away, a Nosferatu hears and awakens.
Years later, Depp is married to Nicholas Hoult. Hoult's employer wants him to travel to Transylvania to sell a ruined local castle to the reclusive Count Orlok there. Depp has been having sexy dreams about marrying Death, and begs him not to go. But the job means a promotion, so he leaves her with his rich friends Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Emma-Louise Corrin.
So Hoult leaves the German town of Wisburg. In the Carpathians, he is shunned for associating with Orlok. One night he witnesses a grouop of villagers dig up and stake a corpse, presumably a vampire (hope he remembers this). When he makes it to the count's castle, he finds the count (Bill Skarsgaard in a LOT of makeup) to be grotesque and imperious, demanding to be addressed as "my lord". Hoult eventually finds him sleeping in his coffin ands attempts to stake him. He gets chased around the castle, but manages to escape.
And so the count loads up a coffin on a plague ship (not called the Demeter) and heads for Germany.
In Wisburg, Depp is having bad dreams, weird spells, etc. The usual doctors can't help, so they send for an unusual one, Willem Dafoe, the Van Helsing character. I'm not sure he can be much help, but at least he doesn't think she's crazy. Besides, what with the plague killing everyone in town, and Hoult's boss starting to get an appetite for blood, maybe there are worse things than a neurotic young wife.
This new version does do a bit to get back to the old myths and manners. Eggers is good at that. But it also leans a bit on the previous movies. The first shot of Castle Orlok seemed to be right out the original Dracula. The town of Wisburg has many canals, giving us shots set up like the original and the Herzog Nosfertu movies. I felt like I was seeing more of an honage than a re-imagining. Also, it was a little hard to find Depp's connection to Orlok. I guess it was based on her repressed sexuality, which worked well when the script supported it. But it didn't always...
But we enjoyed it a lot. Ms. Spenser wanted it to be a bit scarier, but I was fine. We now want to rewatch the original Dracula, the original Nosferatu, the Herzog remake with Klaus Kinski and Shadow of the Vampire, about how the actor who played Orlok in the original was a real vampire. Played by Willem Dafoe, come to think of it.