4K ULTRA HD REVIEW / HDR SCREENSHOTS
(1) Lily-Rose Depp plays newlywed Ellen Hutter, who is seduced by Count Orlok, played by Bill Skarsgård. Many scenes are toned in a bluish black and white. (2) Husband Thomas Hutter tries to comfort Ellen after disturbing seizures.
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“NOSFERATU”
4K Ultra HD & Blu-ray; 2024; R for bloody, violent content, graphic nudity, and some sexual content; Digital copy via Amazon Video (4K), Apple TV (4K), Fandango Home (4K), Movies Anywhere (4K), YouTube (4K)
Best extra: Commentary by writer/director Robert Eggers
ROBERT EGGERS (“The Witch,” “The Lighthouse”) breathes new life (so to speak) into F.W. Murnau’s 1922 expressionist silent horror classic “Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror.”
Eggers wrote and directed this resurrection, with a cast that includes Lily-Rose Depp (“The Idol”) as Ellen Hutter and Nicholas Hoult (“Juror #2,” “Warm Bodies”) as her husband Thomas, with Willem Dafoe, Emma Corrin, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and Bill Skarsgård as the “undead” Count Orlok.
Set in 1838 Germany, young newlyweds Ellen and Thomas are living frugally, hoping Thomas will get a good position in the real estate office of Herr Knock (Simon McBurney). Knock hires Thomas, and his first assignment is a lengthy voyage to the Transylvanian castle home of Count Orlok, to get the contract signed for a house he purchased.
Ominous Nightmares
(1-3) Ellen experiences horrific visions sent to her by Count Orlok.
Meanwhile, Ellen has been visited by ominous nightmares, and fears danger in Thomas’ assignment. Of course, Thomas must go, while Ellen stays with wealthy friends Anna (Corrin) and Friedrich (Taylor-Johnson) Harding and their children. Thomas’ journey to Orlok’s Carpathian castle is filled with spooky portent and the promise that the ghastly fun will really begin for everyone when he gets there.
The many similarities between “Nosferatu” and Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel “Dracula” motivated Stoker’s widow to take legal action against Murnau— but that’s a whole other story. The plethora of cinematic remakes and spinoffs of “Dracula,” plus Werner Herzog’s excellent 1979 version of “Nosferatu the Vampyre,” prove the enduring appeal of this tale of a fearsome man who never dies, provided he has a steady supply of blood.
Eggers’ entry into the vampire canon is definitely worth watching, if only for its superb, meticulously detailed production values. The cast does a fine job, and the period makeup and costumes are spot on; the only questionable elements being the decrepit, decomposing Orlok’s incongruously manicured long fingernails, and a manner of speaking which can verge on the comical.
“Nosferatu” received four Academy Award nominations for Makeup, Cinematography, Production Design, and Costume Design.
Heading to Transylvania
(1) Ellen begs Thomas not to go to Transylvania. (2) Thomas encounters an encampment of Roma people when he arrives. (3) He witnesses a pagan ritual sacrifice in the forest -- or hallucinates it. (4&5) He arrives at Orlok’s castle. (6) Orlok serves dinner to his guest. (7) Thomas is plagued by nightmarish visions. (8) The long fingernails of Orlok, who signed the papers for the Grünewald Manor in Wisburg, Germany. (9&10) Orlok threatens Thomas, and the next morning, he escapes.
VIDEO
Eggers and cinematographer Jarin Blaschke reunite for their fourth feature-length film, and Blaschke also received an Oscar nod for his imagery from “The Lighthouse.” All of their films have been captured on old school 35mm film. This time, it was in the Super 35 format (1.66:1 aspect), using Panavision Arriflex, Arricam ST cameras, and Kodak 5219 stock, which was scanned and mastered in TRUE 4K. Nearly 85 percent was captured with high-speed 35mm lens, a semi-wide angle perspective. They purposely filmed each scene without any over-the-shoulder shots.
During an interview with motionpictures.org, Blaskchke said, “There’s more complexity and subtlety to the color with celluloid film.”
Overall, the imagery is stylish, dark, and shadowy, as many scenes are captured with only candlelight, and all of the scenes are desaturated, while some are a blueish black and white. The HDR10 peak brightness is super low, only 189 nits and averages only 45 nits, while everything was encoded onto a 100 GB disc.
On-screen clarity is superb, especially with the numerous wide shots, as the film grain is natural and tight.
AUDIO
The 4K and Blu-ray both include the atmospheric Dolby Atmos soundtrack with plenty of effects to your height speakers. And your subwoofer will get a strong workout from the LFE channel.
The moody orchestrated score from Robin Carolan (“The Northman”), will keep you on the edge of your seat, and it received a nomination for Original Score from the BAFTA (British Oscars).
(1-3) Prof. Eberhart von Franz (Willem Dafoe) visits the Harding home to treat the afflicted Ellen. (4&5) The plague-ridden ship carrying Orlok to Germany crashes into the dock. He’s the only survivor. (6) Von Franz examines one of the dead sailors. (7) Ellen experiences a violent seizure.
EXTRAS
The Universal/Focus Features bonus features are included on 4K and Blu-ray discs, which are plentiful and very good, including the four-minute longer Extended Cut. A multi-part making-of documentary, called “‘Nosferatu,’ a Modern Masterpiece,” is chock-full of interviews and insights into the actors and production crew.
Eggers’ commentary ranks among the best. He needlessly apologizes at the end of it, for not spending more time discussing “dramaturgy.” Thank goodness he didn’t. Instead, he gives viewers a rich, fact- and anecdote-filled conversation about the hows and whys of almost every aspect of the production. Even the introductory titles are considered; as Eggers notes, the studio logo is depicted in “silent film style,” and the calligraphic titles were handwritten.
A folklore/language expert was consulted for Orlok’s opening lines, spoken in “ancient Dacian, a dead Romanian language.” Much of the production was done in the Czech Republic, with some outdoor cinematography shot in Transylvania and the Carpathian Mountains. Eggers candidly admits when he thinks mistakes were made, such as the scenes in which the hazy atmosphere is so heavy it obscures details of the wonderful set design.
Eggers shares many bits of trivia, such as the reason the Hutters’ pet cat is named Greta is “a nod to Greta Schröder, who played Ellen in Murnau’s original film”; the fake snow was made from instant mashed potato flakes; the scene in the Roma camp in Transylvania is peopled with members of the Roma community there, as well as an elderly woman discovered on TikTok who could speak with an obscure Transylvanian accent.
Eggers says he combined elements of Romanian folklore and vampire mythology to flesh out his screenplay. He notes that unlike many vampire films, in which the undead character bites his victims’ necks, Eggers found folklore saying that vampires desire the “heart blood, retrieved from a victim’s chest,” as Orlok does to his.
Eggers proudly points out the many period details that are barely visible in the film, such as the historically correct iron heels on Orlok’s boots, as were worn by Romanian noblemen in the past, and the hand-fired floor tiles appearing in several scenes. Eggers explains that the contract Hutter signs with Orlok was hand-written in a combination of neolithic symbols and Cyrillic calligraphy. Skarsgård’s deep, ominous manner of speaking is the result, says Eggers, of the actor having worked with an opera coach to lower his voice a full octave.
Eggers discusses decisions to use green screen and CGI in the shooting, which he says were “only done when absolutely necessary,” which wasn’t always good news for the actors. Some examples: In the scene where Knock (Simon McBurney), bites off and eats the head of a pigeon, he was holding a real trained pigeon that was switched with a fake one, whose head was made from flaky hard candy.
In another scene, when Skarsgård is sleeping in Orlok’s coffin (the skull-decorated design for which was based on ancient Polish coffins, says Eggers), the actor was surrounded by actual (trained) rats and real maggots. During the scene in which Anna (Emma Corrin) is being crawled over by rats after becoming a victim to Orlok, Eggers shares that the rodents tend to be incontinent, which meant the set became “horrifyingly smelly.” Discussing Robin Carolan’s excellent score, Eggers points out where the composer had incorporated sounds mimicking the word “Nos-fer-a-tu” into the main musical theme, similar to what the legendary Bernard Herrmann used to do in the many Hitchcock films he scored.
— Peggy Earle
(1&2) Von Franz and Friedrich Harding (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) enter the crypt containing Orlok’s victims, Harding’s wife Anna and children Clara and Louise. (3) Ellen welcomes Orlok, sacrificing herself in order to save the others.
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