#Gothic Themes

[hylemorph]

Ellen as an Inverted Christ-figure

My mind has been marinating in all the delicious gothic themes in Eggers' Nosferatu, especially Christianity and how the story wrestles with it but also makes use of its symbolic language. Full disclosure, I am not religious personally, but I did go to Catholic school for a while and I minored in Classical/Medieval/Renaissance studies, so this stuff is usually near the surface of my media interpretations.

The movie is full to the brim with crucifixes: the window panes of Knock's office, the graves, the shrine on the road to the castle, an old Romanian woman gives one to Thomas and Anna gives one to Ellen. But the mere image of a crucifix does nothing to repel Orlok; the only thing that can defeat him is a metaphorical crucifixion, a selfless sacrifice. Von Franz tells Ellen that only she can "redeem" the people of Wisborg, and that in order to defeat the darkness we must find it within ourselves and crucify it. Ellen, who is uniquely aware of internal darkness, has to carry out this crucifixion as both sacrifice and executioner.

The metaphor is even built into the timeline - Orlok gives Ellen three nights, but when he tells her the first night has already passed. This is similar to how there are supposedly three nights in between Jesus' crucifixion and his resurrection, but the way they count the days is a bit weird, there aren't three full days and nights in between Good Friday and Easter morning. The rising sun is also a common symbol of Easter and resurrection, the ultimate triumph over death.

Ellen parallels Jesus from the very start, because she is uniquely spiritual and uniquely innocent in a world that doesn't trust her. As a teen she is emotionally abandoned by her father, which mirrors the only moment of Jesus' doubt, when he cries out to God the Father and asks why he has abandoned him. I can't give Eggers credit for this part because Thomas was Thomas' name since 1922, but it's super interesting that Thomas the apostle is called Thomas the Doubter, the one who refused to believe in Jesus' resurrection until he was shown his stigmata, which is sometimes used as a sexual imagery. Our boy Thomas also got to see lots of bleeding holes on Orlok .

Ellen sacrifices herself willingly out of pure love, but this is a gothic narrative and the ending is tragic, it leaves us unsatisfied in the moral sense. Right before the final shot we see von Franz starting directly into the sunrise, his face illuminated in the mirror, but its not really a pay-off for his ecstatic calls for redemption! redemption! earlier. Were they really redeemed, or just spared? The crucifixion is the foundation for European society's entire moral framework, the shame of sins that can only be forgiven through sacrifice, but that is exactly the framework that failed Ellen and set off this whole horrific story. Shame and a false need for forgiveness is what turned Ellen's spiritual power into a monstrosity, so how can it redeem them?

I love that Nosferatu was released on Christmas day for these reasons. Obviously Christmas is just a big box office day, but the fact that it's Christmas within the story highlights the cognitive dissonance of it all. This is a dark, inverted version of this fable, and the redemption at the end is meagre and tragic.

[artbynestor]

"Entranced (Contemplation in the Cosmos)" by Nestor

This black and white ink drawing portrays an aged man with a beard lost in deep contemplation within a futuristic spaceship setting. The subtle hints of sadness on his face are contrasted against the vastness of space, where the Milky Way is barely visible in the background. The artwork evokes feelings of isolation and reflection, inviting viewers to ponder the human experience amidst the cosmos.

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#DarkArt, #HandDrawn, #InkDrawing, #FuturisticArt, #SpaceArt, #Contemplation, #Isolation, #CosmicArt, #MilkyWay, #HumanExperience, #PhilosophicalArt, #ArtByNestor, #BlackAndWhiteArt, #EmotionalArt, #SurrealArt

[gothicseverance]

The recurrent theme of imprisonment and fragmentariness.

—Sentimental Horrors

[jadeannbyrne]

Jade Ann Byrne Art Inspired by “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” 2024 - "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1798

Jade Ann Byrne Art Inspired by “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” 2024 – “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1798 The Rime of the Ancient Mariner By Samuel Taylor Coleridge Part I Chapter One of “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” with Jade Ann Byrne as the captain, depicted as Paladin Jade. Jade Ann Byrne Art Inspired by “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” 2024 – “The…

[talesfromthecrypts]

I get so frustrated by "yeah make vampires scary again" stuff every time a vampire movie has a "monster" vampire (Nosferatu, Voyage of the Demeter, etc). It reeks of an attitude that thinks all horror is about something being ugly and horrifying on the outside. If you can't see the horror in Interview With the Vampire, or a Jean Rollin film, or The Hunger, or Carmilla, or the vampire sections of Baldur's Gate because they are attractive that is absolutely an issue on your end. There is such a rich well of themes to dig into with horror and vampires, especially where sex and romance are concerned, but people are so desperate to separate romance and horror. The despair of being frozen as a child even while your mind matures, the loneliness of an eternity alone, the terror of eternal hunger that can't be sated, the awful seduction by something beautiful but monstrous. Trying to turn vampires into just any other monster doesn't make them more horrifying, its just a more kind of overt horror that can only be done so many times and is often covered better by other monsters.

[panthermouthh]

Beware; for I am fearless, and therefore powerful.

[yardsards]

people are pushing against the overly ~wholesome~ fandom culture of the 2010s but they're going too hard and swinging in the opposite direction. now for something to be considered *good* it has to be Dark and Edgy and Complicated and Toxic. and ppl feel the need to justify their liking something with "no it's actually like suuuper dark".

...and that's how you get people calling farcille "toxic yuri".

[undergroundrot]

[ricky-olson]

kai @miwtual​’s birthday countdown event ‎ ‎‎ ‎  ↳ day 13 ☆ horror: gothic horror (classics + personal recs)

[cicada-heart]

bonaventure cemetery 🤍

august 2024

[rottendust]

[yoursghouly]

x

[blackbeautybaby]

Come closer

[gothicseverance]

Gothic (...) confronts us with the inescapable questions, ‘When is now?’ and ‘Where is here?’

—Spectral Readings

[topknots-trunk]

Via SheriffBun.

[papirfecni]

imodna (ft. paté) girlband au……… hear me out