Nosferatu (2025) marks an elegant return to form for director Robert Eggers. It was only a matter of time before he decided to tackle this mammoth of a story in his own right, and his adaptation of the 1922 original is definitely compelling. It’s nothing ground-breaking, though, considering how his previous works have ventured into weirder territory, but it’s a great chiller and loving revitalisation of a classic story. If you’re not a fan of horror, try this film if you want to test the dark waters.
The story of Nosferatu as a franchise is about as ancient as the titular vampire itself. The first film was the radical Nosferatu (1922), breaking new ground and establishing a number of tropes that still haunt horror today. There’s been remakes after remake and endless – rather goofy – sequels since then, with Werner Herzog’s being probably the most notable. But the property has been in its metaphorical coffin for a few decades now, and there’s no one more qualified than Robert Eggers to revive it.
Eggers has always pushed the boat out for horror. The Witch (2015) threw the genre for a loop when it debuted with its nasty re-imagining of folk horror, and The Lighthouse (2019) got rave reviews for a reason – its horribly intimate, highly stylised psychological terrors showing just how weird Eggers was capable of being. But it’s weirder still that Nosferatu (2024), despite being an obvious passion project long in the making with lots of bizarre angles to explore, actually doesn’t push the boat out – at least not that much.
The story of Nosferatu (2024) tracks cleanly to the original 1922 directed by F. W. Murnau, itself a copyright-dodging adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Thomas Hutter, an estate agent in the 1830s German town of Wisborg undertakes a journey into the darkness of a rural and ritual-drenched Transylvania, there to negotiate a property sale with the necrotic Count Orlok. His wife Ellen, plagued by nightmares, begs him first not to go and then to return safe to her. Orlok’s growing obsession with Hutter’s wife runs deep, however, and the vampire’s seaborne arrival at Wisborg brings apocalyptic disaster and a terrible ultimatum for Ellen.
All of this is done with Robert Egger’s virtuoso attention to style. Colours are so muted that long stretches of the film are essentially black-and-white. Dark forests stretch out like huge prisons against empty grey skies. A single flickering candle illuminates terrified faces against the seething night. Even the film at its brightest resembles the contemporary paintings of Caspar David Friedrich – everything lonely, everything gothic, every emotion heightened to bursting, from love to hate to terror. Put simply: this film looks good.
Then why is this film only four stars? Nicholas Hoult is great as Thomas Hutter; Lily-Rose Depp proves she’s a top-tier actor with a physically frightening turn as his desperately prescient wife Ellen. Willem Defoe, meanwhile, is enjoying himself immensely as the swivel-eyed vampire-hunting philosopher who’s been imported from the set of a cheesy 50s horror film.
But in a way, that is the problem. The Lighthouse (2019) felt radical. Nosferatu (2025) chooses to go in the direction of being approachable, and slightly cheesy, and hewing very close to the source material. There’s plenty to muse about on the vampire’s connection to sex and lust and repressed desire…everything that other films and other books have explored in detail already. Fantasy and horror writers love vampires for all that they can represent, and Nosferatu (2025) might make that connection more explicit than predecessors, giving Ellen a more interesting role as befits her character – but the film doesn’t really do much else with its findings, beyond looking really stylish and a bit scarier than normal.
Compared to the really pervasive and intense horror of The Lighthouse (2019), though, this doesn’t leave you quite as disturbed. On the other hand, it’s a really strong outing and much better than Egger’s previous The Northman (2022). There’s nothing wrong with being accessible and stylish.
For an introduction to an old classic lovingly updated, and for those who don’t want to contend with the worst scares horror has to offer, you can happily sink your teeth into this.
Still: Universal Pictures