Professor Popinjay's Compendium of Perspicacity

A Non-review by Professor Popinjay

Yee! This was rated R for good reason! Don’t take the kids.

I’ve seen some rated R stuff that might have the kids shaking in a cold sweat in the corner of their room but this… yikes! There’s blood. There’s boobs. There’s sex. Sometimes all three at the same time.

While it never seemed gratuitous or even provocative, these graphic scenes lasted a bit longer than I personally was comfortable with.

That stuff aside though, this film was chilling! Dracula is such an archetype and while many films have tried to recreate visually what Bram Stoker achieved in literature, I feel this Nosferatu film is one of the best and most terrifying versions of Bram Stoker’s horrifying story. I realize the irony of this statement considering the history of Nosferatu.

If you don’t know, the original 1922 German film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, was an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897). Living members of the Stoker family sued and all copies of the original film were ordered destroyed. Several copies remained intact however.

A remake was made in 1979 called Nosferatu the Vampyre (which I will be seeing ASAP). While it was based on the 1922 film, it strangely used Stoker’s names for the equivalent characters, even using Count Dracula instead of Count Orlock.

Another remake was released in 2014 using colorized backgrounds from the original 1922 film.

Since its original release, many scenes and images from Nosferatu have been used throughout popular culture from TV commercials to SpongeBob. It seems despite the Stoker family’s best efforts, Count Orlock is here to stay.

While one can almost trace the similarities to Dracula scene for scene in this new adaptation, the Nosferatu story does feature some major differences too. I’d advise one to go into this understanding its background but do not expect just a Dracula copy. It may have started out as such but the story has evolved into its own thing really.

Personally, and not to discredit Stoker’s achievement, I’ve always found the original story of Dracula to be slightly anti-climactic. In Dracula, Van Helsing (oh spoiler for Dracula btw) Van Helsing studies the correspondence of all the concerned characters and deduces what Dracula’s weaknesses are and where he will be almost Sherlock Holmes style (Arthur Conan Doyle, a contemporary of Stoker, I might add). They then find Dracula dormant in a dirt-filled coffin, give him the ol’ stakey-stake and go on their merry way. The end. That’s it. There’s no fight. No struggle. Barely even an epilogue.

I won’t spoil Nosferatu for you but the 2024 version has quite the thrilling climax indeed. It takes all its cues from the original but does it in a way that could only be done in this modern age.

There were empowering aspects about the resolution but also some unspoken underlying ethical dilemmas about it that the film didn’t address. Such ethics weren’t applicable to the original film, tame as it was, but probably should be considered if it is to end the way this new version did. I shan’t go into further detail here.

I wish anyone who had the stomach for this kind of film could see it in the theater for one main reason: Count Orlock’s voice. It permeated the theater and resonated deep within everyone there. It was mesmerizing. The audience was silent as the grave when he spoke. Bill Skarsgård had worked with opera singer Ásgerður Júnísdóttir to find Orlock’s voice. Quite the difference from Pennywise.  Nicholas Houllt sold it too. You could feel his fear as he trembled before this formidable and ancient monolithic presence.

I found it fascinating that Willem Dafoe should be the Van Helsing equivalent in this film considering he once played Max Schreck (the actor who originally played Count Orlock in 1922) in the 2000 film Shadow of the Vampire, which depicts the story of director F.W. Murnau as he worked to create Nosferatu. Schreck is noted as trained in acting by the great Konstantin Stanislavski. A method actor, Schreck seemingly went a little kookoo while playing the part of Orlock. If you recognize the name Max Schreck, it was used by Christopher Walken’s character in Tim Burton’s Batman Returns. We’ve come full circle.

Add Shadow of the Vampire to the list of films I want to see.

I went to see this even though it wasn’t necessarily my cup of tea for the same reason I went to see Last Voyage of the Demeter. I might hate slasher flicks but I love a great monster flick and more so if it comes out of classic literature. This was history. Extremely bloody lewd history. But hey, how is that different from any other history if we’re splitting hairs?

Finally, I appreciated the nod to the Stoker Family at the beginning of the credits with its acknowledgement of Bram Stoker’s influences and contribution (even if they were originally stolen technically) to the film. Sure, it’s all public domain now but I thought it was a nice gesture.

Bram’s great grand-nephew, Dacre Stoker, is still around and producing books centered on Dracula. He has apparently connected a fictionalized version of his famed ancestor into a prequel to the original Dracula, titled Dracul. I got hold of the “sequel” also written by Dacre from the dollar store titled Dracula, The Un-Dead. I skimmed through it but didn’t care for what I read. But you don’t have to take my word for it. 

Question! Why did this film come out Christmas Day while Red One came out in November and was gone by December!?! I think they got their movies mixed up. Friggin’ gnomes!