Nosferatu (Robert Eggers)

An impressive movie alright. Looked stunning on 35mm in the Lighthouse and it was a real throwback to see some scratches and blemishes and the projectionist lining up the film to fit the screen properly after it started.

I regretted not seeing The Northman on the big screen so wasn't going to miss this one.

Nosferatu – 7/10

After coming out of the blocks with The Witch and The Lighthouse (both 5 star films for me) I hold Eggers to an almost impossibly high standard. The disappointment of The Northman meant that I’d tempered my expectations a bit, but I still hoped this would be better.

The cinematography, production design, score etc… are all on point, but I found the casting and acting to be uneven across the board. Eggers is great at creating atmosphere, with The Witch being the best example of what he can achieve, but I think a lot of that came from the performances he got out of the actors. Everyone in The Witch felt authentic. Bits like the scene where the son starts speaking in tongues and the use of those creepy twins singing about Black Phillip were bone chilling stuff. Somewhere in between The Lighthouse and The Northman, Eggers ability to coax these types of performances from his actors has begun to wane. Perhaps it’s because certain casting choices have been thrust upon him by studios (Nicole Kidman cough cough), but in Nosferatu, performance levels vary quite a bit from scene to scene.

Skarsgård and Dafoe bring their A-game, Lily-Rose Depp is also very good, but for a lot of the others it just felt like actors reciting lines and struggling with the antiquated dialect. It’s not something that I ever questioned or noticed in his earlier films.

Still, there’s a lot to admire here. The first encounter between Hoult and the monster is superb. The way the monster looks, sounds and moves is expertly done. The shot of Nicholas Hoult standing at the crossroads as the demon carriage approaches is one of the most stunning things I’ve seen on the big screen for a while.

It all goes to show that Eggers is clearly a world class technician, but I’m not sure if the art is there with his story telling just yet.

It was kinda a humourous comment in fairness. The poster said that they "absolutely loved it entirely. I didn't see any deficiencies in it at all, whatsoever". But then gave it a 8/10 rating. If there were no deficiencies whatsoever, then why did the poster dock the 20%?

Ok. It wasn't me who made the comment.

But it's a little bit funny. If there are "no deficiencies whatsoever" in the movie, what else can the director/actors/producers etc. do to get the perfect 10 from you. Or even a 9.

I agree with this. You gotta leave room for those films that truly floor you. When you see a 10/10 film it can be a transcendental experience. Something that you think about for weeks afterwards, that shapes your outlook on life.

But most films are just films.

It was very personal to me, but Aftersun. I was in bits for weeks after seeing that.

Films I've given 5 stars to recently:

Anora

The Substance

I Saw the TV Glow

Past Lives

The Lighthouse

Uncut Gems

Monster

The Holdovers

A few slightly older ones:

Amadeus

City of God

Oldboy

Glengary Glenn Ross

Dazed & Confused

The French Connection

The Wrestler

Sexy Beast

Amores Perros

Spirited Away

The 35mm version at the IFI has a lot of scratches and dust for a print that surely should be very new. Are the artefacts digitally created, I wonder. Some sort of 'film damage' filter?

Grew up watching & being a fan of horror/scary films, Started of with Hammer as the gateway drug, then onto real scary films like Alien & Nosferatu (1979 Herzog), and for me the dial stopped there.

The new Eggers Nosferatu is great in it's own right, scary as hell and full of dread and foreboding. An ever present feeling of death & gloom, with the Count casting his shadow (literally) over the entirety of the film. Excellent acting & casting, top drawer cinematography & sound, haunting & very bloody, but ……

For me it's too perfect, too polished, too well made and too refined. Highly recommended if you want to see & hear a bloodcurdling blood fest of savagery with the beast from hell …. but given the choice I'd favour the not so polished 79 Herzog movie with Klaus Kinsky. Simplicity & charm, slightly off beat and quirky too, not so highly produced, yet very scary and haunting in it's own charming way.

On saying all that I'd i give the new Nosferatu 9/10 as a stand alone horror story in it's own right 👍

Have to agree somewhat. Visually excellent and the earlier scenes where Thomas / Hoult travels to Transylvania are well shot. After that though, it's like Eggers threw a whole lot of Dracula / Nosferatu cliches at the screen, hoping a few would stick. I didn't find it remotely scary I must admit and I don't think there's anything new that hasn't been covered in other vampire flicks. Ineson and McBurney are typically fine and Skarsgard is ok, but rather difficult to understand. Dafoe provides a guest appearance. Just 5 / 10 (for cinematography) from me.

Finally got to see this last night and I really enjoyed it.

Visually stunning and for me the story moved along at a fine pace.

How anybody could say this was boring was beyond me. Do all scenes have to have a major impact. Can you not enjoy world building or character development?

Fine performances from a great cast with Willem Dafoe and Lily Rose Depp being the outstanding two