Every great auteur has one actor that they love to bring back with each project, a good luck charm, whether they’re the lead or just a small cameo.Akira KurosawahadToshirō Mifune,Martin Scorsesestill hasLeonardo DiCaprioandRobert DeNiro, andWes Andersonhas a Rolodex full of the same seven actors who make up 40% of his cast lists. With the recent updates about the casting ofWerwulfand the existence of yet anotherA Christmas Caroladaptation, it seems we can now say thatRobert EggersandWillem Dafoeare one of those pairings. Dafoe has now been in most of Robert Eggers' films since he hit the mainstream, and is always a welcome helping of chaos and intrigue, be it a dash or a full serving. However,I’d argue that another actor who has been in multiple Eggers films is the perfect fit for Eggers' gothic melodramas, and that’sGalactus himself, Ralph Ineson.
Ralph Ineson Has Appeared In Three of Robert Eggers' Films
It must be said, Ineson hasn’t been given the same amount of screentime that Dafoe has been allowed, but the roles he has had vary greatly from each other.Ineson has now appeared in three different Eggers films, each one tasking him with a different level of responsibility and position to play. InThe Witch, he’s William, the patriarch of a Puritan family who slowly succumbs to the madness of a curse unsuspectingly inflicted on them by a coven of witches, and Ineson is effectively the second lead behindAnya Taylor-Joy. InThe Northman, he plays a Rus sea captain named Volodymyr who only plays a factor in one or two scenes involving seafaring in an otherwise landbound film, so that’s more of a glorified cameo. In Eggers' most recent film,Nosferatu, he plays Dr. Sievers, a medical doctor who tries fruitlessly to treat multiple people afflicted with vampiric influence, and he’s a firm supporting presence who is integral to the plot’s progression. Ostensibly three dissimilar functions and three diverse personalities,they’re all unified by how much Ralph Ineson feels like an embodiment of the universe Eggers builds out, and his natural gifts as an actor make him the perfect voice for Eggers' storytelling cues.
Robert Eggers Casts Ralph Ineson To Use Our Perception of Him Against Us
It’s impossible to think of Ineson without immediately hearing him even before he opens his mouth, ashe has a voice that truly cannot be mistaken or replicated. It booms and stretches with the distorted resonance of a robot speaking in the middle of shutting down, and therefore makes it nearly unthinkable that he would be anything less than all-powerful and completely imposing on-screen at every moment. This is why it’s no surprise that characters who are unholy forces in human form feel tailor-made for him, like the aforementionedGalactus inThe Fantastic Four: First Stepsor the titular Green Knight inThe Green Knight. Even in more forgettable fare likeGunpowder Milkshake, where he shows up in the third act as your typical crime boss, I remember being struck by how quickly I took his character seriously, entirely due to how his voice sounded.
Galactus Prepares To Destroy the Earth With a New ‘Fantastic Four: First Steps’ Hot Toys Figure
Ralph Ineson will portray the villain in the new film.
But when Robert Eggers casts him in one of his films, he’s usually used in a drastically different context. If Ineson pops up in an Eggers film, thenhe will probably wind up having that supposed authority and gravitas turned against himself (and the audience)to emphasize how helpless the human characters are to the forces of darkness that surround them. InThe WitchandNosferatu,specifically, his characters are framed as being men of power who usually know how to handle their responsibilities and can easily assert their skillset or wisdom, but are backed into a corner that they can’t get out of. InThe Witch, William usually knows how to be the head of his family and keep them all disciplined under his orders, but he easily loses his patience and grip on reality as the witches' power overwhelms the family. InNosferatu, he’s a man of medicine at a time when that meant practically being asuperhero, and yet none of his treatments help any of the main characters in the slightest and are fruitless in the face of Orlok’s (Bill Skarsgård) powers. In both cases,the best-laid plans of mice and men are for naught, and authority winds up meaning nothing.
Robert Eggers Uses Ineson to Sell Fear to the Audience
So, if Ralph Ineson is an actor who Robert Eggers respects and likes working with, then why would he so consistently kneecap his on-screen aura? I’d argueit’s a way for Eggers to convince his audience just how dire the situations presented are. In terms of power scaling, taking a person like Ralph Ineson and having even him be left helpless, overpowered, or lost makes it sink in how truly unthinkable the evil at work is. If an actor who personifies being the head man in charge is looking around for answers and sweating bullets over how little he can actually do, then what hope do the actors who don’t have those kinds of take-charge energies have in the same situation? To bring back the comparison to Eggers' other favorite boy, Willem Dafoe, who is usually the solvent in Eggers' world and somebody who can fix the situation or at least make our protagonists feel better about what they have to face.Ralph Ineson is more a harbinger of the doom to come via his inevitable victimhood, and is therefore, in a sense, more vital to the success of Eggers' visions. As they say, you can’t make an omelet without cracking a few eggs, even if that egg has such a lovely voice.
A family in 1630s New England is torn apart by the forces of witchcraft, black magic and possession.
