Nosferatu Review

Nosferatu is a film which comes directed by Robert Eggers who some may know as the director of The Witch (2015) or The Northman (2022). This film stars Lily-Rose Depp, Nicholas Hoult, Bill Skarsgard, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and Willem Dafoe. Nosferatu has a run time of 2 hours and 13 minutes.

Nosferatu was a film that I was looking forward to seeing, it had a great trailer and a excellent cast. I also love to watch a vampire horror film at the cinema. It looked like it was everything I wanted in a movie. However when I was watching the film, I was lost in the plot and had a hard time following what was going on initially. I wasn’t ready for the film, it’s very deep and filled with complicated symbolism. This is a movie where you really need to pay attention to what the characters are saying and you need to make sure you listen because otherwise you’ll be lost.

When I first left the cinema after seeing this movie, I thought it was a disaster of a movie. But after I slept one night and started thinking about what I saw the next day, I started to deconstruct the plot and put together what Nosferatu was in my mind. I also read and watched things on the internet about the film. After some time, I understood what this film was about and what the meaning of it all was. This led me to believe that for person going to watch this film at the cinema, the person has to be a film cinema nerd or a film critic to enjoy it. For casual viewers who just showed up and bought a ticket to this, I think they might have a hard time understanding the film. Nosferatu is a film that I’d recommend to people who like to deconstruct it, examine the themes and symbolism with in and have discussions about it.

Essentially what Nosferatu is about is, it’s a story about a vampire who has an obsession with a young woman. The vampire will do some very bad things to the town to be with her, but is only motivated by his obsession for her. The young woman is also troubled and is plagued by demons and is dealing with her own problems. The two coming together is an odd thing to watch, but it happens. What’s hard to understand is why the vampire is obsessed with her or why is she plagued by demons. That goes a bit beyond what this review will cover because those are spoilers. But if you go an see the film, these are some of the questions you can explore and discuss with your friends.

I didn’t mind the performances in this film. For some reason though the acting felt like I was watching a play instead of a movie. The actors performances felt like a theatre performance. It’s hard to describe, but it’s what I felt at times when watching this movie. This is probably the best performance I’ve seen from Lily-Rose Depp in anything she’s done so far. I also enjoyed Willem Dafoe in this film and wished both of these actors had more screen time. The others in the cast, I felt were forgettable though and I don’t remember them anymore.

Overall I suggest thinking about if this is a film you want to see at the cinema. Take a friend who likes to deconstruct movies with you so you can have discussion about Nosferatu after seeing it. Prep yourself so that you pay attention to what’s going on so you don’t get lost as things unfold. If you can do these things, I think you will enjoy it. If you can’t, then I suggest picking another movie at the cinema this week that’s made more for casual audiences to consume.