Nosferatu (2024)

Nosferatu (2024) was a visually and cinematographically stunning movie. But beyond this, I think the story itself begs for a Zizek style Lacanian psychoanalysis. Unfortunately I’m not very well equipped in this area to deliver such an analysis. Therefore I will cut this entry short. However, I think Nosferatu character itself embodies what Lacan calls jouissance. A form of pleasure that’s painful, in fact can only be achieved through pain. Keeping this in mind I can come back here to try to deliver such an analysis after writing the entry on The Sublime Object of Ideology where I’ll re-visit Lacan to deliver an analysis of the book. Hopefully by then I’ll rewatch the movie and perhaps watch the original Nosferatu (1922) as well.

For the time being, I’d like to state that I really enjoyed the timeless aspect of the movie. By staying true to the geist of the Victorian times, either in costumes, settings, language or most importantly, characterization, Robert Eggers truly achieves a timeless piece. I didn’t think characters were developed or tried to be portrayed from a modern perspective to score points with The Academy. For the most part of the movie, I felt like I put on my Victorian goggles.

Mentioning of the Victorian reference, the story is set at the very beginning of the Victorian era, 1830s. So re-visiting the previous Lacanian angle, it can be used to find a middle ground between Foucault and Lacan. Namely, using Lacan’s psychoanalysis (not Fraud’s psychoanalysis as Foucault does himself) as a point of origin to explore Foucault’s ideas on the history of sexuality and how the state and society as a whole became more acquainted with the individual’s sexuality at the turn of the 19th century. I will refrain from delivering any sort of analysis using this angle just yet because as I said I feel ill-equipped but I will note the following to use later:

The Harding Couple, Anna and Friedrich were true Victorians. Anna was a clear coil to the main character Ellen Hutter that was possessed by jouissance. And Friedrich embodied the “voice of the modern, rational” man and thereby what Foucault refers as Scientia Sexualis, science, or more precisely pathologization, of sex. Hence, Ellen could be representative of a female body that resists Victorian pathologization. And could be a reflection of how jouissance resists the Symbolic Order.

I hope to return to all this sometime in the future when I feel more comfortable with all these concepts and ideas. But for now, adios.