Nosferatudirector Robert Eggers addresses Count Orlok drinking blood from the chest and not from the neck in his new horror movie. AfterThe Northman(2022), Eggers returns to horror with his upcoming adaptation of the 1922 German film of the same name. BillSkarsgård leads theNosferatucastas the villainous Orlok, a vampire who becomes transfixed with a local, haunted young woman, and the movie features some key differences from more traditional vampire stories, including how the monster drains blood from his victims.
In a recent interview withGamesRadar+, Eggers explains why Count Orlok drinks blood from his victims' chests inNosferatu, explaining thatit was all about leaning more into a folkloric take on a vampire. According to the director, the old folk tales he drew from describe victims feeling vampire attacks in their chests rather than their necks. Check out Eggers' explanation below:
You’ll notice that [in this film] Orlok drinks blood from the heart, not the neck. Now obviously you can’t pierce a breastbone, so it doesn’t really make sense. It makes much more sense to drink someone’s blood from their neck.
But in folklore, when people are experiencing vampiric attacks it’s similar to old hag syndrome [a colloquial term for sleep paralysis] where you have pressure on your chest, so people interpreted it as vampires drinking blood from their chest. But there are also folk vampires who didn’t drink blood, but just fornicated with their widows until their widows died from it. So I think it’s all part of the source material…
What Eggers' Nosferatu Change Means For The Movie
Will Eggers' Movie Break A Vampire Trend?
While there has been no shortage of vampire movies over the last two decades, Eggers has ensured thatNosferatustands apart from the crowd. His folkloric vision for Count Orlok means that, not only does the vampire drink blood from his victims' chests, but he also looks more like an actual Transylvanian corpse. He isn’t slick or sexy, and he doesn’t look like an actual monster, meaningCount Orlok is an outlier when it comes to the vampires of modern Hollywood cinema.
Robert Eggers' Nosferatu Will End A Tiring Decades-Old Vampire Trend (With A Clever Twist)
Robert Eggers has some very specific words to describe his version of Count Orlok in Nosferatu, and they promise to end a tiring vampire trend.
Many vampire movies in recent years, includingAbigail(2023),The Last Voyage of the Demeter(2023), andRenfield(2023), have not been successful. It’s possible that Eggers' fresh take on the vampire horror subgenre will break this trend. Early reactions toNosferatuhave been generally quite positive from critics, so the folklore-inspired take on the story seems to be working for them, butit will be general audiences that determine whether the movie is a success or not.
Our Take On Count Orlok In Nosferatu
Eggers Continues To Surprise
With the twoItmovies and his performance as Pennywise the Clown, Skarsgård has proven himself adept at transforming for roles.Nosferatuhas proven this yet again, andSkarsgård truly disappears into the character of Count Orlok. This ultimately makes for a truly chilling cinematic experience, and it makes the actor’s future projects even more exciting.
In addition to Skarsgård, theNosferatucastfeatures Lily-Rose Depp, Nicholas Hoult, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Emma Corrin, Willem Dafoe, and Ralph Ineson.
Eggers, too, is now cemented as a master of the horror genre. It remains to be seen what he will tackle next, buthe continues to put fresh spins on ideas that may at first sound familiar. Time will tell whereNosferatufalls in the ranking of his larger filmography, but he’s certainly a director to keep an eye on.
Nosferatu
Cast
Nosferatu is a remake of the 1922 silent film of the same name from director F. W. Murnau. Robert Eggers is crafting his own version of the story for the reboot as writer and director, with Bill Skarsgård stepping into the shoes of Count Orlok. Nosferatu tells the tale of a young woman who falls victim to a vampire utterly infatuated with her.
