This one was a mixed bag for the two of us. I didn't mind it, but Jamie absolutely despised it.
You may think that despise is a strong word but I am not kidding you, he was disgusted by this movie. What he thought was going to be a movie about Dracula was actually a boring display of bad acting and the odd random sex fest or nipple. That's the censored version of his words for you.
I on the other hand, stupidly did not make any connection prior to entering this movie that it was anything to do with the Dracula story. I thought Count Orlok was an early vampire in a similar strain of Bram Stoker's creation, and his story was of terrifying an old German town. I assumed this remake of the 'lost' silent movie would bring it into modern day and as a vampire fan decided not to watch the trailers or research it at all and let it take me somewhere new. In all honesty if I knew it was a retelling of Dracula I wouldn't have bothered. I realised the route we were going down 5 minutes into the movie when the similarities of Hutter and Harker struck me. This is the trouble of trusting cameos in Spongebob and creating a narrative from there...
Upon researching the original movie I found that Nosferatu was an unauthorised adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula and due to this had to undergo some name changes, those of which were common German ones at the time. Name changes were not enough to distract from the obvious plagerism and the people behind it were sued. The movie was destroyed and thus deemed lost to history and yet some copies survived and can be streamed online if you wish to witness a silent, black and white version of Dracula.
My issue with movie adaptations of this story is always the romantisim of the beast. We end up focusing on the sex and exploit this, which means the villany of the monster in the tale gets lost in translation and it is merely displayed as lust and before you know it violence against women is a turn on. Nope, not having it. Back in the 1800s when the book was written, not that it is overly sexual in any way, the point and the fear was that foreign men, especially those as well off as Count Dracula, would come to the shores of the UK and steal the hearty English man's women. It was a lure for us fair lasses, these riches, the accent, the mystery. This evolved into a villain, folklore surrounds the allure. It couldn't possibly be that women simply found these men far more interesting and due to their culture they simply treated women better, as in with respect and dignity.
Now Stoker's female characters all have a voice. I mean this in respect of they are allowed to express their thoughts and emotions openly, and help lead the fight against Dracula. Women in this era of course were not massively respected, and were either arm candy or servants to put it bluntly and it's been this way for too long. But Mina and Lucy were not, however in Nosferatu Frau Hutter and Frau Harding were still pretty much background characters even though the whole movie was meant to revolve around Lily-Rose Depp's Hutter and her evil stalker.
I have strong feelings against these adaptations as I feel they sexualise the bloodshed and violence. The film loses its horrific tone and becomes camp and erotic. Take Bram Stoker's Dracula with Gary Oldman and Keanu Reeves, what was supposed to be a retelling of a well loved novel, the forefront for horror, became something akin to The Rocky Horror Picture Show. It was sex, boobs and Lucy being horny all the time. This modern take on Nosferatu dialled it down a little bit, but equally followed this strain of cinematic delivery.
The film itself was beautiful. It was dark, so you couldn't see a lot, much like something from the DC Universe. It was bleak, the colours from the lighter frames reflecting this, which helped to emphasise the overall tone of the film, and the angles and overall cinematography was picturesque. It was well put together, but it was also fairly boring at parts. The adaptation had lost something of the story in its attempt to take a step back from it's original inspiration, as well as trying to stand out in its own right. We seemed to have focused too much on background characters and everyone acting like this was in Ellen's mind than Orlok's power and his influence over her and her loved ones. Don't get me wrong this was explored, but in a handful of scenes and the evil was not a constant theme that trailed through the film.
I terms of the acting in this movie, that was really what let it down. If I wasn't left laughing at certain bits due to shoddy performance I might have been a bit more appreciative. I love Aaron Taylor Johnson, I think he is talented and a strong actor. However, his performance as Friedrich Harding was comical. His huffy, higher class accent reminded me of a teenager putting on a top hat and acting posh. Sticking on a moustache and adopting a stiff upper lip and entitled attitude just wasn't a role worthy of the man and made it seem as though he forgot how to act. His scenes became distracting and I couldn't take him seriously. It was almost Watson worthy, of course I refer to Nigel Bruce's stint as the ever doting yet ditsy John Watson in Basil Rathbone's version of Sherlock Holmes. Considering Watson was always meant to be intelligent, this portrayal left the sidekick as more of a dimwitted nuisance. Taylor Johnson's Harding was on par with this. Over the top, and foolhardy.
Lily-Rose Depp was better. She was emotive, but also a little rigid. I don't blame her acting at all here however, sadly I think it came down to the material she was given to perform. If you are given a 2D character to play who has not been well rounded enough for the actor to add something to, it comes across on screen. Ellen Hutter was always meant to die it seems, she was always meant to be an outcast to the characters in the film, and yet somehow the writers also isolated her from the audience as well. This was either a mistake or very clever. She came across as hateful and boring. Even a little pointless. Putting her against Emma Corrin's Anna Harding didn't help as again this was no reflection on Corrin, but Anna was boring and the most exciting thing she did was die.
Willem Dafoe was enthusiastic and warm as always. No matter what, you can always rely on the man to bring a whimsical approach to interesting characters and make them warm and alarming even if everyone else is pale and slow.
Nicholas Hoult had a challenge here to carry the blight of his leg of the storyline for both his character, Taylor Johnson's, and Depp's. He was the glue, and to be honest he was the best character in the whole film aside from Dafoe, Skarsgard and McBurney.
Bill Skarsgard was on another level here. If I didn't already know he was playing Orlok I'd have had no idea. Prosthetics were insane, not a trace of the man underneath was recognisable. He also played big and foreboding and yet powerful and frail very well.
McBurney (Of the Simon variety) played Herr Knock, this counterfeit version's Renfield. Jamie thought the pigeon scene was unnecessary, I agreed although can see why watching him bite the head off was put in (I had my eyes and ears shut tight as I knew it was coming), but my point here was this man was the most convincing of the lot. He was a nutter and played it well. Actually the most three dimensional character in a very murky, ghost-of-a-classic movie.
Ralph Ineson who played the good doctor is basically the same in anything I've ever watched him in. His unmistakable voice and tall frame lent a familiar essence to the film yet he will forever just be the man who narrates Salvage Hunters.
In short then, as I have gone on for a while, I'm giving it a 4/10. Nosferatu was underwhelming, yet also pretty, but ultimately dull. It was an experience, but not the one I had hoped. It certainly didn't bring in anything new or exciting for Vampire lore, nor did it do it any favours. Have we exhausted the vampire trope once and for all?
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