F. W. Murnau’s silent film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror owes an insurmountable debt to author Bram Stoker’s 1897 classic novel, Dracula. However, director Robert Eggers finds additional inspiration in more modern “vampire occurrences.” And the filmmaker’s updated Nosferatu actually pulled from these newer stories, which were written during this century, to complement his vision.
And while Nosferatu might be dropping into theaters this Christmas, there isn’t anything festive about the real-life tales Eggers tapped into in order to differentiate his spine-tingling storytelling from the ancient vampire’s sordid history. That includes Murnau adapting his 1922 work from the pages of Stoker’s book without asking for permission to use the material from the late author’s widow, Florence Balcombe. Eggers elaborated on Nosferatu’s inspirations in a brand-new interview with Vanity Fair:
“Even as recently as the early 2000s, there have been vampire occurrences. There was a strigoi [a.k.a. an undead being] occurrence in southern Romania, someone’s uncle died and was attacking his niece at night. The village vampire hunter, the old guy who remembered how they used to do it, disinterred the body, took the heart out, performed the ceremony, and this uncle no longer bothered his niece.”
Eggers, whose other creepy cinematic concoctions also include The Witch and The Lighthouse, continued by saying in the same sit-down:
“You wonder what is the dark trauma that doesn’t die when someone dies. How do you explain it? It’s pretty tragic to think about it in the modern context. The vampire is a much better scapegoat than a witch, because when you kill a witch, you’re killing a human. But when you’re disinterring a corpse, they’re already dead. This is the power that these creatures have.”
Get Ready for a Vastly Different Count Orlok
Fans were already praising the new Nosferatu’s teaser, which was greatly surpassed, in terms of sheer footage, by the more detailed official trailer from September. However, don’t expect to get a much better look at Bill Skarsgård’s Count Orlok until the film drops this December. And even then, die-hard horror enthusiasts won’t likely recognize the blood-sucking creature of the night. Director Robert Eggers told Vanity Fair that his movie’s villain is “more of a folk vampire” than what’s been presented on-screen before. The filmmaker continued by saying:
“This Orlok is more of a folk vampire than any other film version. That means he’s a dead person. And he’s not like, ‘I look great and I’m dead.’ Folk vampires in some ways are more visually similar to zombies […] The reason why he looks the way he looks, and he dresses the way he’s dressed is because for the first time in a Dracula or Nosferatu story, this guy looks like a dead Transylvanian nobleman. Every single thing he’s wearing down to the heels on his shoes is what he would’ve worn. That’s never been done.”
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Skarsgård went to great lengths to differentiate his Count Orlok from other interpretations, including Max Schreck’s memorable performance in the silent era motion picture. In fact, his voice in the film mimics an ancient tongue, which is the dead language of the Dacian. And the actor also utilized a short story written by Nosferatu’s director to better understand the Count’s magical origins. Eggers also told VF:
“In order to make this story my own and integrate all the stuff that I had been reading — and to also understand the characters better — I wrote this novella that created a lot of backstory for all the characters. It also had tons of scenes I knew would never be in the movie, just to flesh out the character dynamics and flesh out the relationships. There were a couple appendices, and one of these was an Orlok origin story.”
Nosferatu drops in theaters on Christmas Day. In addition to Skarsgård’s highly anticipated performance as Orlok, the horror flick features the talents of Willem Dafoe, Lily-Rose Depp, Nicholas Hoult, Aaron-Taylor Johnson and Emma Corrin, who is coming fresh off of her indelible performance as Charles Xavier’s sister, Cassandra Nova, in Deadpool & Wolverine.
Nosferatu is a remake of the 1922 silent film of the same name from director F. W. Murnau. Robert Eggers is crafting his own version of the story for the reboot as writer and director, with Bill Skarsgård stepping into the shoes of Count Orlok. Nosferatu tells the tale of a young woman who falls victim to a vampire utterly infatuated with her.
- Release Date
- December 25, 2024
- Runtime
- 132 Minutes
- Studio(s)
- Regency Enterprises , 1492 Pictures
- Distributor(s)
- Focus Features , Universal Pictures
- Character(s)
- Count Orlok , Ellen Hutter , Thomas Hutter , Professor Albin Eberhart Von Franz , Friedrich Harding , Anna Harding , Knock , Dr. Wilhelm Sievers , Dockhand , Head Nurse