Feeling empowered as heart of vampire horror story

Actress Lily-Rose Depp finds it appealing that a female character calls the shots in Robert Eggers' Nosferatu

- Alison de Souza

In the latest retelling of the Count Dracula story, it is the young woman pursued by the vampire who becomes the protagonist.

Now showing in Singapore cinemas, the horror film Nosferatu follows Thomas Hutter (Nicholas Hoult), a young man tasked with selling a crumbling Transylvanian manor to the reclusive Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgard).

But as the vampiric count becomes infatuated with Hutter's new bride Ellen (Lily-Rose Depp), she starts being plagued by visions that lead to a dark and complex relationship.

The movie - which was up for Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Production Design and Best Make-up and Hairstyling at the Oscars on March 2 - is written and directed by American film-maker Robert Eggers, who made the acclaimed horror films The Witch (2015) and The Lighthouse (2019).

At Nosferatu's Los Angeles premiere in late 2024, Depp, 25, says Eggers had a different take on Irish author Bram Stoker's Dracula, the 1897 Gothic horror novel that established the quintessential vampire archetype.