Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series spotlighting the scripts behind awards season’s most talked-about movies continues with Nosferatu, Focus Features‘ gothic horror from writer-director Robert Eggers.
Focus Features released the film on Christmas Day, since becoming Eggers’ highest-grossing movie at the domestic box office with $53 million and counting.
In Eggers’ Nosferatu, estate agent Thomas Hutter (Nicholas Hoult) travels to Transylvania for a fateful meeting with Orlok, a vampiric prospective client.
RELATED: ‘Nosferatu’ Review: Robert Eggers’ Gothic Romance Is A Perverse, Technically Brilliant Tango With Death Eggers’ early fascination with Nosferatu ignited a passion for filmmaking that would shape his career.
The stunning chiaroscuro visuals draw the audience into a world of Eggers’ gothic nightmare.
Writer-director Robert Eggers’ gothic horror film Nosferatu, Focus Features, is the latest installment in Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series, which highlights the screenplays behind the most talked-about films of the awards season. Bill Skarsgård plays Count Orlok, a fictional character who first starred in the 1922 silent film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror, which was directed by F. B. Eggers. The story is set in 1830s Baltic Germany. W… the Murnau.
With $53 million and counting, the film, which was released on Christmas Day by Focus Features, is now Eggers’ highest-grossing domestic film. Among its accolades from critics’ organizations this season, it received five nominations for Critics Choice.
Estate agent Thomas Hutter (played by Nicholas Hoult) journeys to Transylvania in Eggers’ Nosferatu to meet with a vampiric potential client named Orlok. Hutter’s new bride, Ellen (Lily-Rose Depp), is left in the care of their friends Friedrich and Anna Harding (Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Emma Corrin) while he is away. A force far beyond Ellen’s control is encountered as she struggles with visions and growing dread. Additionally starring are Willem Dafoe, Simon McBurney, and Ralph Ineson.
RELATED: Review of “Nosferatu”: Gothic Romance by Robert Eggers Is a Perverse, Technically Outstanding Tango With Death.
Eggers’ career-defining passion for filmmaking was sparked by his early fascination with Nosferatu. Henrik Galeen’s screenplay and Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula served as inspiration for him. He and his high school classmate Ashley Kelly-Tata then adapted the story for the stage and performed it at their school. Edouard Langlois was impressed by their production and asked them to move it to the Edwin Booth Theatre in New York.
Naturally, as a child, Max Schreck’s performance and image haunted me. Both the straightforward Nosferatu fairytale and the enigmatic vampire had a fundamental quality. Furthermore, audiences undoubtedly gasped in horror as Hutter flung open Orlok’s sarcophagus lid, conjuring up the undead monster’s stench. The film adaptation has fascinated Eggers since he was a young boy. “How could I find my own way there?” he asks.
The way Eggers reimagined the Count is a masterwork of horror filmmaking. His sinister, decaying persona, veiled in darkness and enhanced by a spooky soundtrack, is both ominous and alluring. The breathtaking chiaroscuro images transport viewers to Eggers’ gothic nightmare.
In order to understand why Nosferatu needed to be told again, Eggers wrote a novella that included scenes and lengthy backstories that he knew would never be in the movie. To make that novella uniquely mine, I had to write it. “.”.
His script is below.
