Nosferatu Remake Unleashes The Best Dracula Movie Ever Made, See The Proof
It’s been a long time since film audiences have been given a great Dracula feature to enjoy. In fact, the last one to receive critical accolades and fan appreciation was the Francis Ford Coppola-directed Bram Stoker’s Dracula, which debuted in theaters in the fall of 1992. But with the recent release of the Nosferatu trailer, it seems as though horror fans will soon be given what looks to be the greatest Dracula film of all time.
Nosferatu will hit theaters on Christmas Day 2024.
The upcoming Nosferatu is up against some stiff historical competition in the Dracula category. Even with the promising elements that its trailer shows, the film’s primary antagonist will undoubtedly be compared to the two actors who played Count Orlock before (Max Schreck in the 1922 original and Klaus Kinski from the 1979 remake Nosferatu the Vampyre), but also Dracula icons Bela Lugosi, Christopher Lee, and Gary Oldman.
Many of the exterior shots were filmed on location in Romania, Prague, and the Czech Republic. One of the Prague locations was Rozmital Castle, a 14th century structure that looms over the scenes that include it.
What Bill Skarsgard brings to Nosferatu is only seen in a glimpse from the newly released trailer, but the film’s teaser doesn’t need its star to show that it will become a horror powerhouse.
The scenes that only partially unfold in the trailer show the madness that Nosferatu has created before his arrival on screen, relating the real-life buildup of excitement to finally see Skarsgard as the ultimate vampire.
The characters shown on screen during the Nosferatu trailer display abject fear and/or madness, helping to build the tension and horror that the 90 second teaser is aiming for.
Aside from the terror that is slowly burning, viewers get to see one of the film’s co-stars, Willem Dafoe, in what looks to be one of his greater performances.
Nosferatu director Robert Eggers’ most recent film is 2022’s The Northman-a brutal and acclaimed retelling of the story that inspired William Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Hamlet.
The Nosferatu trailer also gives audiences a sense of the upcoming film’s settings, which appear to largely be authentic places. Many of the exterior shots were filmed on location in Romania, Prague, and the Czech Republic. One of the Prague locations was Rozmital Castle, a 14th century structure that looms over the scenes that include it.
A great Dracula film will need the perfect actor to play the part. Even though the trailer doesn’t show much of Skarsgard, the actor was reported to have spent six hours a day in the makeup chair preparing for the part. Skarsgard brings to the table experience playing some of the genre’s most notorious evil creatures and men to perfection, most notably Pennywise the Dancing Clown in the IT films from the late 2010s.
The Nosferatu trailer also gives hints of the same “plague” that ravaged the village in the original film. A clip of a scene is shown where a line of townspeople are carrying the coffins of the dead above their heads, the result of Nosferatu’s handiwork.
From this snippet, we can imagine that some of the original film’s elements will be included, though whether this version stays more in line with its earliest predecessor or if it will follow Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel more closely remains to be seen.
What is apparent is that the Nosferatu trailer seems to give excited fans what they’ve been looking forward to for decades; a big-budget production of a Dracula film that terrifies the soul as much as it excites the eyes.
The Nosferatu trailer comes out far ahead of the highly anticipated horror film’s December 25 release date in U.S. theaters.
