Happy New Year.
Robert Eggers' fourth feature is writer-director's first without 'The' in title.
Characters retain their names from 1922 original (famously an unauthorised adaptation of Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula), except Dafoe, whose predecessor was Bulwer.
Also, Dafoe portrayed Max Schreck as an actual bloodsucker in E. Elias Merhige's Shadow of the Vampire (2000).
Bill Skargård - Count Orlok
Nicholas Hoult - Thomas Hutter
Lily-Rose Depp - Ellen Hutter
Aaron Taylor-Johnson - Friedrich Harding
Emma Corrin - Anna Harding
Willem Dafoe - Professor Von Franz
Ralph Ineson - Doctor Sievers
Simon McBurney - Knock
Summary
A woman called Ellen is attacked by a ghoulish humanoid, but terrifying incident is apparently a 'nightmare'.
Years later in Germany, 1838, Ellen's husband Thomas accepts a commission from his employer Herr Knock to sell a stately home to the infirm and wealthy Count Orlok at his castle in the Carpathian mountains.
While dining with Orlok, Thomas cuts his thumb slicing bread and after mesmerizing him, monstrous host feasts on his blood, revealing himself to be a vampire.
The next night, Orlok takes Thomas's locket containing a lock of Ellen's hair and has him sign a strange document written in an occult language.
Thomas fails to kill Orlok with a pickaxe and flees.
Back in Wisborg, Ellen's doctor Sievers consults his mentor Professor Von Franz over patient's disturbing bouts of sleepwalking and seizures, who deduces she is under the spell of the Nosferatu.
All concerned conspire to kill Orlok and end the plague.
Dread storm rising
First off, Germany didn't become a country until 1871, 33 years after the film is set.
No fucking excuse.
Considering Eggers co-directed a stage production of original in high school, I couldn't wait to sink my teeth into this.
Unfortunately, despite gorgeous cinematography and a brilliant colour scheme, passion project was rather dull (particularly the second half).
Modest gore is complemented by some disturbing imagery, but pale in comparison to previous works.
Although antagonist doesn't ascend stairs, him entering Hutter's home and shadow crossing walls mirrors one of cinema's most iconic moments.
Rambling about medieval devilry, Dafoe claims:
"I have seen things in this world that would've made Isaac Newton crawl back into his mother's womb."
Err, okay.
Eggers says Orlok's huge moustache is a nod to folklore and not Transylvanian culture.
Another theory is that facial growth was lifted from Stoker's novel Dracula.
Whatever the reasoning, it looked ridiculous, as did fur-lined coat and prosthetic penis.
Finally, the more he spoke, the sillier character became.
