Nicolas Hoult is in the lead role in the Dracula movie Renfield, but that isn’t the only movie about Dracula that the actor is starring in, and Nosferatu can make up for the disappointing 2023 release. The actor plays the titular character in Renfield, who is Dracula’s (Nicolas Cage) servant and tries to escape the wrath of the Prince of Darkness by leading a normal life in New Orleans. Cage is incredible as Dracula, and it’s almost as if it was the character he was born to play. But while Hoult’s scenes with Cage are hilarious, R.M. Renfield is terribly underwritten and barely has any character development despite being the protagonist.
Renfield received mixed reviews from critics and sits at a “rotten” 58% on Rotten Tomatoes. The movie has been criticized for its unlikeable characters, and though it’s technically a horror-comedy, while it’s full of limbs being torn apart, the “horror” aspect of the film leaves a lot to be desired. Renfield isn’t remotely scary or suspenseful, and it’s a total comedy rather than a “horror-comedy.” However, Hoult’s next horror movie can make up for Renfield’s shortcomings. Not only is the British actor coincidentally starring in another Dracula-based movie, but it has the potential to be genuinely terrifying.
Nicholas Hoult Is Starring In Nosferatu After Renfield
Hoult will play Thomas Hutter in Nosferatu, which will be a gothic horror movie from writer and director Robert Eggers, who previously directed the visually stunning psychological horror The Lighthouse and the revenge epic The Northman. The movie is a remake of the 1922 German film of the same name, which is essentially a Dracula adaptation and based on the original Bram Stoker novel. The only reason the vampire’s name was changed was because of licensing rights and to protect the studio from copyright infringement (via The Vintage News), with Thomas Hutter also based on Jonathan Harker from the original novel.
Hoult joins an incredible cast, which includes Aaron Taylor-Johnson and regular Eggers collaborator Willem Dafoe. But most excitingly, following his role as Pennywise in It and Marquis Vincent de Gramont in John Wick: Chapter 4, Bill Skarsgård will continue his hot streak of villainous roles by playing Count Orlok. A release date is yet to be announced, but the movie has been in production for over a month in Prague (via Variety). Given that Eggers uses mostly practical effects and shoots on location, post-production likely won’t take as long as other movies, and it could potentially be released before 2024, meaning that Hoult will have starred in two Dracula movies in just one year.
How Nosferatu Will Be Totally Different From Renfield (& Likely A Way Better Movie)
Nosferatu is following an incredibly creative streak from Eggers, known for dark tales full of brutality and horror, meaning that it’ll be tonally and thematically on the other end of the spectrum to the comedy-centric Renfield. Eggers achieves what few horror directors have, which is scaring audiences without resorting to jump scares. Simply the tone and aesthetic of his movies are terrifying, and that’s exactly the tone that Renfield failed to achieve. Between Eggers’ stunning visual flourishes, his ability to get intense performances out of actors, and on-location shooting, despite the Nosferatu remake’s development hell, it has the potential to be the Dracula movie that Renfield should have been.
Source: The Vintage News/ Variety
