Robert Eggers has released the first official trailer for Werwulf, and it ends where the film seems most interested in going: with Aaron Taylor-Johnson transforming into a werewolf. The trailer gives the clearest look yet at Eggers' latest feature and confirms that the film is headed for Christmas Day.
That is the update viewers have been waiting for because Werwulf has not yet been given an official synopsis. Instead, the film is being sold with a tagline calling it “a harrowing tale of devotion, damnation, and the devil within,” while the trailer leans on grainy 4:3 images, an ominous voice warning of a family curse, and the return of Lily-Rose Depp and Willem Dafoe alongside Taylor-Johnson.
The trailer also matters because it keeps Eggers inside the lane he has built across The Witch, The Lighthouse, The Northman, and Nosferatu: historically rooted horror with a heavy mythic pulse. Werwulf was written with Sjón, financed by Focus Features, and produced by the studio alongside Eggers and Sjón, with Maiden Voyage's Chris and Eleanor Columbus among the executive producers.
Eggers is working from a recent stretch that has only raised the stakes. Nosferatu broke out as a critical and commercial hit, taking in around $181M worldwide after a $21.6M three-day opening and a $40.8M five-day opening, and it went on to earn five BAFTA nominations and four Oscar nominations. Werwulf now arrives as the next test of whether that momentum can carry into a new winter release.
For now, the trailer answers the simplest question and leaves the larger one open. Viewers know the film is coming on Christmas Day and know what the final image is selling; what remains hidden is the full shape of the curse Eggers is building around it.
