Overview
Nosferatu. The Wolf Man. Frankenstein. All three names are icons of classic horror cinema. All three are headed back to the big screen in 2025. The entire trio are also making a comeback with impressive directors leading the charge, with Robert Eggers (The Witch, The Lighthouse, The Northman) giving Nosferatu a new spin, Leigh Whannell moving from The Invisible Man to Wolf Man and Guillermo del Toro behind the latest iteration of Mary Shelley's masterpiece (to the surprise of no one who has seen the Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio, Nightmare Alley and The Shape of Water helmer's past movies).
Nosferatu will hit picture palaces first — and, in true Eggers fashion, it's keen to unnerve. So, what happens when the acclaimed filmmaker directs his attention to the second-most famous name there is in vampire tales for his fourth feature? If both the initial teaser trailer and just-dropped new sneak peek for Nosferatu are anything to go by, embracing a twist on Bram Stoker's Dracula is set to turn out chillingly.
More than a century has passed since the initial Nosferatu flickered across the big screen, a German Expressionist great that adapted Stoker's story with zero authorisation, hence changes such as its count being named Orlok. The film has been remade before, with Werner Herzog (The Fire Within: A Requiem for Katia and Maurice Krafft) giving viewers 1979's Nosferatu the Vampyre. Now, Eggers is sinking his teeth in — and visibly loving it.
The new Orlok: Bill Skarsgård, fresh from action-star mode in Boy Kills World but pivoting back to creepy villains, just swapping IT and IT: Chapter Two's Pennywise for another insidious pop-culture figure. In the two looks at Eggers' Nosferatu so far, the writer/director plays coy with his monster, but not with Orlok's impact. "My dreams grow darker," cries Lily-Rose Depp in the initial trailer, trading the nightmare of The Idol for the gothic horror kind as Ellen Hutter.
Joining Skarsgård and Depp is a stacked cast of fellow big names, including Willem Dafoe enjoying another stint in gothic mode after Poor Things and returning to Nosferatu after his Oscar-nominated performance in 2000's Shadow of a Vampire, where he played Max Schreck, the IRL actor who played Orlok back in 1922. Nicholas Hoult jumps from dancing with Dracula in Renfield to more undead eeriness, and Emma Corrin (A Murder at the End of the World), Aaron Taylor-Johnson (The Fall Guy) and Ralph Ineson (The First Omen) all also feature.
In the US, audiences have a silver-screen date with Nosferatu on Christmas, but viewers Down Under will see the film from Wednesday, January 1, 2025.
Check out the full trailer for Nosferatu below:
Nosferatu releases in cinemas Down Under on Wednesday, January 1, 2025.
Images: courtesy of Focus Features / © 2024 FOCUS FEATURES LLC.