Nosferatu (2020 film)

Nosferatu is an upcoming horror film, set to release on October 30, 2020. It will be a remake/reboot of the 1922 silent horror film of same name. The movie will be directed and produced by Guillermo del Toro and written by del Toro and Vanessa Taylor, their second screenplay together, after The Shape of Water. It will star Hugo Weaving, Gary Oldman, Elle Fanning, Michael Shannon, Asa Butterfield and Dafne Keen. The movie will be produced by TSG Entertainment and Double Dare You Productions, and distributed by Paramount Pictures.

The film was announced on October 31, 2017, after Paramount bought the rights to produce a new film about the character. Guillermo was confirmed as the director one month later, and Hugo Weaving was announced as Count Orlok on January 2018, with Gary Oldman confirming that he was playing Van Helsing two weeks later.

Synopsis
Set in New York City, on 1958, the story follows a dutch immigrant named Abraham Van Helsing, who came to the US looking for a new life. He then meets Count Karl Orlok, a german businessman and executive who traveled to America so he could expand his business. Abraham starts working for him, and ends up discovering his deepest secrets, including his biggest one: He's a vampire, who wakes up every thirty years to feed himself.

Full Plot
The movie starts with Edward Van Helsing (Gary Oldman) in front of a crowd. He then starts to recite Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven, while everybody watches. In the middle of the group, there is a little girl with black hair and a pink dress. As Edward finishes, the crowd starts to clap, including the little girl. He smiles, and goes off the improvised stage, hugging the girl, his daughter, Julia (Dafne Keen). They talk for a while, with Edward mentioning the opportunities they will get when they arrive at the United States. They laugh, and sleep.

As the sun rises, the ship where they were traveling arrives at New York, alongside another, bigger ship. As Van Helsing and his daughter come out of the ship, Edward looks to the side, and makes eye contact with a strange, bearded man with a suit. It's his first encounter with Count Karl Orlok (Hugo Weaving), who had just arrived at America as well. Orlok is surrounded by his henchmen and businessman, with a blonde woman using a formal dress on his side. It's Laura Gable (Elle Fanning), his right-hand woman. They walk to a hotel, while Edward goes with his daughter to a house that they rented. While talking to Laura, Orlok mentions Edward, calling him a "strange, but good-looking and confident man". He demands that Laura finds Edward, and hire him.

On the following day, while Julia goes to school, Edward starts walking around New York, looking for a job. He is stopped by Laura on the street, who calls him for a coffee. They have a conversation, and Edward is hired. He then goes immediately to Orlok's office, to meet him. As he arrives there, Orlok greets him, and they have a conversation. Orlok mentions that Edward reminds him of his father, a hard-working man that did everything to win money and become rich. After the conversation, Orlok gives Edward a handshake. Edward feels something strange, and goes home confused. On the next day, he sees that there's a mark on his hand, and he becomes even more confused.

On his first day of work, he begins to see the strange way Orlok acts with other people. After getting out of work, he's stopped by a man in a car. The man identifies himself as "Knight", and tries to bribe Edward on finding personal information of Orlok that could compromise him. Edward refuses and goes home, but he can't sleep. He leaves his home, while Julia is sleeping, and goes to a library next to his house. In there, he looks for newspapers, trying to discover any information about Orlok. He finds something: a book, telling about the legend of a creature, called Nosferatu. The book describes Nosferatu as a blood-thirsty creature that can create illusions, change its appearance and make someone think they're on a nightmare. It also calls Nosferatu "Nature's Greatest Creation", and says that he awakes every thirty years to feed himself, only to go back to sleep. This leaves Edward puzzled, and on the next day, he plans to talk with Laura and ask about Orlok.

While Edward is on the library, Orlok is visiting one of his henchmen, alongside Laura. Whatever, Orlok asks Laura to stay outside of the house, while he makes "business". Inside of the house, Orlok fights with the tall, blonde man and kills him, biting his neck and sucking his blood. He leaves the house, normally, and both leave. On the next day, Edward pushes Laura to a corner and both talk, with Edward asking why Orlok is so strange. Laura says that she doesn't know, and that Edward shouldn't make too many questions and abuse of his status as the "protege of the boss". Laura leaves, and Edward is even more confused. Later on, Edward leaves for his house, but ends up being kidnapped. He wakes up on a dark room, sitting on a chair. He looks to the front and sees the same man that tried to bribe him. He looks to the side, and sees a younger man. The older man presents himself, saying that his name is Bruce Knight (Michael Shannon), and the other is Lucas Knight (Asa Butterfield), his son. Bruce says that one of his henchman saw Edward going to the library last night, and that he knows something about Orlok that he doesn't want to say. Edward refuses to say anything, and Bruce hands a contract to him, promising to pay him more than Orlok is paying. Edward once again refuses, and Lucas throws a sack of money on him, as an example of what he's going to earn. Edward refuses once more, and ends up being beaten by Bruce's henchmen, and left to die in an alley.

While unconscious, Edward have's a dream with Nosferatu. The vampire tells him to stop before he ends up being the next victim. He wakes up at Laura's house. Laura explains that she found him unconscious on the alley, and brought him to her house. Edward thanks her, and tries to explain his dream and his theory. Laura doesn't believe that her boss is a vampire, and Edward leaves, against Laura, who asked for him to stay because he was still hurt. Instead of going home, Edward stops on the library once again, and looks for the book about Nosferatu, but doesn't find it. He questions his sanity, almost convincing himself that Orlok is just a normal person, and that he was getting crazy. Edward ends up sleeping on the library, dreaming once again with Nosferatu, who says that there's no more time, and that if Edward is on his way, then he will be destroyed. He wakes up, only hours later, while the sun is getting out, and runs home, to see if Julia was there. Whatever, his daughter went missing.

Without changing his clothes, Edward goes to his workplace, looking for Orlok. Right after meeting him, Edward punches him on the face, asking where his daughter was. Orlok says that he's innocent, while his henchmen take Edward off him. Orlok immediately fires Edward, who leaves. Laura watches the scene, and goes for her boss, to see if he was okay. After touching him, Laura feels something strange, and sees a mark forming on her hand. She asks for the rest of the day off, and Orlok accepts. Laura runs away, going for her home. In there, she tries to call Edward, without success. When she turns around, she sees that Orlok is in there, laughing. He says that he tried to spare Laura, but since she tried to interfere on his business, he will have to take him.

While walking around, looking for his daughter, Edward faints, and have's another dream with Nosferatu. He tells Van Helsing to go for an abandoned house away from the city, and that he will find Laura and his daughter in there. He wakes up and runs, looking for the house. He ends up finding it, and when he enters, he sees several corpses on the house, all of them with a bite on the neck. He turns around and sees Orlok, still on human form. Orlok says that he really liked Edward and tried to spare him, just like he did with Laura, but since Edward ended up interfering on his business, he will make Edward, his daughter and Laura his final victims. After he finishes talking, he starts to transform, transforming on his main form, Nosferatu. Edward looks to him with rage, and grabs a baseball bat that was there, running on him and giving him various shots to the head and belly, to no effect. Nosferatu gives him a punch, that ends up throwing him to the other side of the room, breaking the wall.

Cast

 * Hugo Weaving as Count Karl Orlok | Nosferatu — The main antagonist and title character, Count Karl Orlok is a german businessman and executive, who's actually a vampire who wakes up every thirty years to feed himself.
 * Gary Oldman as Abraham Van Helsing — A dutch immigrant who came to the US for a new life. He meets Orlok and starts working for him, before discovering everything.
 * Elle Fanning as Laura Gable — The right-hand woman of Orlok, who doesn't know about his real intentions. Later on, she joins Abraham on his battle against Nosferatu.
 * Michael Shannon as Bruce Knight — A businessman and CEO of Knight Enterprises and the rival of Orlok. He tries to bribe Abraham on the hope of finding something that could destroy his rival's career.
 * Asa Butterfield as Lucas Knight — The son of Bruce, and heir of Knight Enterprises.
 * Dafne Keen as Julia Van Helsing - The daughter of Abraham, and the love of his life.

Production
A remake of the 1922 classic has been rumored since the late 90's, when 20th Century Fox Pictures firstly expressed interest on buying the rights to the character and producing a new film. Whatever, after months of rumours, nothing happened. In the following years until 2017, various companies have tried to get their hands on the rights for a movie, until Paramount successfully acquired them and immediately announced a new film.

Writing
Writing immediately started after Guillermo del Toro was announced as the director, with del Toro recruiting Vanessa Taylor to write the screenplay. It was written between November 30, 2017 and August 25th, 2018. According to del Toro, three drafts of the screenplay were written, with the first draft taking place on current days instead of 1958. The final script was completed on August 25th, 2018.

Casting
Casting was decided by del Toro. He focused more on casting both Orlok and Van Helsing, making a list of actors that he wanted to play the characters. On the list for Orlok, Josh Brolin, Hugo Weaving, Hugh Jackman and Jack Nicholson were the main choices. On the list for Van Helsing, Ryan Gosling, Gary Oldman, Michael Shannon and Mark Hamill were the main options. Hugo was announced as Orlok on January, and Gary as Van Helsing two weeks later.

Elle Fanning and Michael Shannon were announced on February, and Asa and Dafne were announced on April.

Principal photography
Filming began on October 31, 2018, in New York, Toronto, Berlin and Amsterdam, and wrapped up on February 18, 2019. Re-shoots took place on April and May of 2019.

Soundtrack
The film's score was composed by Alexandre Desplat, on his second movie alongside del Toro.

Tracklist

 * 1) He Comes
 * 2) Night
 * 3) Blood
 * 4) Heads
 * 5) Van Helsing
 * 6) Thou Shalt Not Resist
 * 7) Kill Them All
 * 8) Blessing
 * 9) Laura
 * 10) Light on the Darkness
 * 11) Horror, Horror!
 * 12) Nature's Greatest Creation
 * 13) Nightmare
 * 14) Real Face
 * 15) Blood & Fire
 * 16) Heaven
 * 17) Monologue
 * Yes
 * 1) Final Words
 * 2) Peace
 * 3) The End?

Release
The movie was released on October 29th, 2020 on Brazil, and October 30th, 2020 on the rest of South America, North America, Europe and Oceania. Asia and Africa only received the movie on November 27th, 2020.

Marketing
The first poster for the film was released on January 16th, 2019. The first trailer was released three days later, on January 19th, including the tagline "You can't kill what doesn't die". It was well received by audiences.

The second and final trailer came out nine months later, on October 31, 2019, as a "halloween gift", according to del Toro. It was posted on his twitter, and later, on YouTube. The tagline was: "Let him in".

Home media
The movie was released on Blu-ray, DVD and digital download on March 15th, 2021.

Critical reception
The movie received positive reviews from critics. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film currently holds a 93% "Certified Fresh" rating based on 255 reviews, with an average rating of 7.8/10. The website's critical consensus reads: "Even though Nosferatu can be considered a different movie, it still does justice to the original classic, with its cinematography, score, del Toro's direction and great acting by all of the cast." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 84 out of 100, based on 60 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". IGN gave the film a 9,2/10 and IMDb holds a score of 9,0/10 according to 284,387 votes.

Critics praised Gary Oldman's acting, with many saying that Oldman made the character feel real to many people, making the audience understand his motivations. Weaving was critically acclaimed for his role as Orlok, with many critics comparing the character to the original Orlok from the 1922 film, and ​​​​with some saying that it was a better character overall.

Audience reception
The movie was well received my audiences, with many fans of the original film praising the movie for having a new story, but still paying homage to the original.

Box office
Nosferatu grossed $78,9 million in the United States and Canada, and $200,9 million on the rest of the world, for a total of $279,8 million.

Possible sequel
After the success of the film, del Toro talked about the possibility of a sequel during an interview: "''It was fun working on this movie. If they called me, I would do a sequel, without a doubt. But it's too soon to talk about that, I guess it's better for us to wait". ''

Hugo Weaving also expressed his interest on returning for a sequel, alongside Gary Oldman. Weaving commented that he pitched an idea for del Toro, of having a sequel with a new Van Helsing fighting Nosferatu, maybe Edward's daughter.

Trivia

 * Paramount originally wanted to partner with Universal Pictures and create their own Monster Universe, but the idea was scrapped.
 * The movie was originally going to take place on current days.
 * Paramount is planning to construct their own universe based on the movie, with a TV series currently in development.
 * Quentin Tarantino was originally planned to direct the movie, but he left the project to develop his next movie, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
 * The second draft written by del Toro was about three brothers fighting Nosferatu, after they discovered that the vampire killed their parents.

Taglines

 * You can't kill what doesn't die.
 * Let him in.
 * Embrace your nightmare.
 * Open your mind.
 * Let the horror sink in.

Polls
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