Starring: Corey Hawkins, Aisling Franciosi, Liam Cunningham, David Dastmalchian, Javier Botet, Stefan Kapicic, Nikolai Nikolaeff
OUR RATING: ★★★☆☆
Story:
Supernatural horror directed by André Øvredal. Based on the chapter from Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula, The Last Voyage of the Demeter (2023) follows the merchant ship Demeter, which was chartered to carry private cargo, fifty unmarked wooden crates, from Carpathia to London. Strange events befall the doomed crew as they attempt to survive the ocean voyage, stalked each night by a merciless presence onboard the ship. When the Demeter finally arrives off the shores of England, it is a charred, derelict wreck. There is no trace of the crew.
Where to Watch:
Best Quotes
Captain Eliot: This log is a record and a warning. And if it finds you, God help you, as he has abandoned the Demeter. We tried to stop him. If we didn’t succeed, God have mercy on your souls.
Wojchek: Learning about boats ain’t the same as keeping one afloat. What did the sailor ever learn from a book that did him an ounce of good when he was lost at sea?
Clemens: Astronomy, for one. You can lose a chart. You can lose a compass. But you can’t lose the stars, can you?
Wojchek: [referring to the man that returned his coins] This is more than I paid to bring the damn cargo here. What did he spit at the end? “Good leave” or “good riddance”?
Olgaren: “Good luck”.
One-Eyed Sailor: [after he drops the crate with the dragon symbol on it] You never said nothing about dragons. I know this mark. It is a bad omen.
Wojchek: You could have killed the boy. I don’t give a whore’s a** about dragons!
One-Eyed Sailor: Keep your gold, the devil’s serpent. God save you all. May he save the ship. May he save the crew.
Wojchek: [referring to the ship] She moves like a fat pig with all this weight.
Toby: Have you ever seen a real dead man, Mr. Clemens? I have.
Toby: You knock on wood like this if there’s any trouble. Or to signal a change of watch, or if the sky’s looking fierce. You can hear it all the way from the bunks to the captain’s on a clear night. I swear. I’ve heard it.
Clemens: Yes, I believe you have.
Toby: This used to be a lumber ship, built the old way. But now everyone wants steam ships. Captain says there’s no joy in metal ships.
Clemens: Well, that’s the thing about progress, isn’t it? It cares not for joy, your captain’s or otherwise. The Demeter’s a fine boat. No doubt.
Toby: [referring to the animals] The faster we eat them, the less crap I have to clean up.
Abrams: Going to get myself a proper shave and one of them waistcoats with the tails on. Ooh, the English ladies love them tails. Almost, almost as much as they love me.
Olgaren: If you put them over your face, maybe.
Abrams: [referring to the their bonus payment] What are you lot going to do with yours?
Joseph: “The generous soul will be made rich, and he who waters will also be watered himself.” Although the Lord might not mind if I just simply watered myself.
Clemens: Well, everything I desire in this life, unfortunately, coin will be of no aid.
Abrams: And what would that be, now?
Clemens: To understand this world. The more of it I see, the less any of it makes sense.
Captain Eliot: The world cares little for sense, Mr. Clemens. Perhaps it is not meant to be understood but rather experienced and accepted.
Clemens: Perhaps. But I need to get to the heart of it. And understand why the world has so much goodness inside it, and yet… Isn’t that what all men desire? Deep down.
Wojchek: [referring to Anna] A stowaway.
Clemens: A stowaway who is going to die if we don’t administer proper medical care.
Wojchek: You want to help her? Who knows what kind of diseased rat infections she has.
Clemens: [to Wojchek] You are of aid to me, or you are in my way and need to leave. In either case, please make yourself apparent and fulfill your purpose.
'That's the thing about progress, isn't it? It cares not for joy.' - Clemens (The Last Voyage of the Demeter) Click To Tweet
Clemens: We’ve done all we can.
Wojchek: Then maybe she’ll wake up in time to see us toss her to the waves. We let Poseidon deal with stowaways, always have.
Clemens: I didn’t save this girl’s life only to watch you end it. At least let us off at the next port.
Wojchek: “Us”, is it? I see where your loyalty lies, Mr. Clemens.
Captain Eliot: I would prefer not to have my final voyage at the helm of the Demeter marred by the death of a young woman. Stowaway or not.
Olgaren: You’re making all sorts of friends, aren’t you, Mr. Clemens? Woman on the ship. Bad omen. Hmm? Bad luck. Men won’t be happy.
Clemens: The men don’t need to be happy, do they, Mr. Olgaren? They just need to get this boat to London, huh?
Olgaren: I’m trying to help you, son. Keep spouting words like that. Maybe she’ll make it to London, but I reckon you’ll be swimming.
Olgaren: There is something out there. Someone.
'This world. The more of it I see, the less any of it makes sense.' - Clemens (The Last Voyage of the Demeter) Click To Tweet
Petrofsky: [after Huckleberry and the livestock are killed] We all know. Bad luck, woman on board. Makes skies turn, animals go mad.
Joseph: I guess we say the Lord’s Prayer over cabbage and potatoes for the rest of our voyage.
Olgaren: No man did this. Evil is on board. Powerful evil.
Olgaren: The skies are angry.
Clemens: The skies feel nothing, my friend. It’s precipitation and air pressure, as knowable as the workings of this ship.
Olgaren: I saw something last night. There is something unnatural on board with us.
Clemens: I’m afraid I don’t believe in superstitions, Mr. Olgaren. I believe in science and in nature. And in Saint Nicholas, since Joseph wouldn’t give me food otherwise.
Olgaren: Keep your science. I saw your face in the dark last night. Your eyes. You saw it, same as I.
'The world cares little for sense. Perhaps it is not meant to be understood but rather experienced and accepted.' - Captain Eliot (The Last Voyage of the Demeter) Click To Tweet
Joseph: You could burn this ship to the keel, Mr. Clemens, and the rats would just nest in the ashes. Something drove them off. A boat without rats, such a thing is against nature.
Wojchek: Petrofsky must have been drunk. Slipped on the deck and fell overboard.
Clemens: Right after he bled all over the deck?
Wojchek: And what were you doing up in the middle of the night? You had his knife in your hand when we found you.
Clemens: Of course. I killed him. And somehow managed to keep myself free of all the blood you see staining the boards, then I rang the signal bell to report myself. It’s quite brilliant, isn’t it, Mr. Wojchek? Open-and-shut case.
Anna: He is here. We have to get off this boat. Now! All of us! We have to get off this boat!
Anna: He will kill us all!
'There are things in this world that we can't control, but we do our best.' - Clemens (The Last Voyage of the Demeter) Click To Tweet
Anna: He is here on the ship. He has been all along.
Clemens: He?
Anna: It is spoken in my village of an evil that lives in the mountain above. A castle older than any of us.
Clemens: Evil?
Anna: An evil that appears as a man when it wants to hide its true nature. And at night he feeds on the blood of the innocent.
Anna: I have lived in the shadow of that castle my whole life. I knew that the elders, they made bargains for the safety of our people.
Clemens: You were given to this man?
Anna: It is not a man.
Clemens: Then an animal?
Anna: No, it is not some mindless animal either. Do not make that mistake.
Anna: We call him Dracula.
Clemens: And you believe that he brought you on board? Why?
Anna: He brought me here to feed.
Clemens: [as he sees the bite marks on her] Dear God.
Anna: He is here, Mr. Clemens. The thing that wears the skin of a man. In the night, it drinks our blood, and he is on this ship. Which means we will never leave it.
Clemens: [referring to Olgaren’s wound] This looks like a bite. It looks like the same bites we saw in the animals, the same bites that ravaged the girl in the carpenter’s shed.
Wojchek: You think some devil did this? Like she says?
Clemens: I do not.
Wojchek: Good.
Clemens: But something did. And that is real, and on board, whether we choose to believe in it or not.
Captain Eliot: Search the ship, Mr. Wojchek. Not just the hold. Everywhere.
Abrams: I don’t like this. Sun’s going down, and he’ll be coming.
Captain Eliot: God seems to have deserted us, and we are drifting to some terrible doom. Lord help us.