The Thing in the Coffin

Bram Stoker’s Dracula as an appropriated-footage film that uses earlier cinema versions of the narrative together with other photoplays about bloodsucking revenants – to visually stunning and stirring effect. A Dracula unlike any other made so far.

You can’t kill Dracula. He comes back, time and again, not only because he’s undead, but because we seem to need this figure to talk about who we are. After two recent grand-style Draculas (Robert Eggers’ 2024 Nosferatu and Luc Besson’s 2025 Dracula: A Love Tale), IFFR favourite Péter Lichter now unveils his leaner yet equally sumptuous take on Bram Stoker’s novel – in the shape of an appropriated-footage film that uses earlier cinema versions of the narrative together with other photoplays about bloodsucking revenants.

Compared to his unrelentingly grim Poe-inspired piece, The Grey Machine (IFFR 2025), The Thing in the Coffin feels unexpectedly soft while rich and vibrant. This is due as much to Lichter’s play with colours (just marvel at the torrents of red unleashed in the beginning) as to the strong correlation between the Stoker quotes and the visuals, which lends the work a superb drive and remarkable depth. The Thing in the Coffin stands tall as a take on a popular myth unlike any attempted before.

– Olaf Möller

Trailer

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