'Renfield' review: Nicolas Cage's campy Dracula keeps horror comedy from totally sucking
Nicolas Cage is dead and loving it. If only the rest of “Renfield” had as much campy bite.
As bossy narcissist Count Dracula, Cage channels Bela Lugosi’s big bad vampire via “Office Space” in the horror comedy (★★ out of four; rated R; in theaters now), and Nicholas Hoult’s embattled title servant is just as wacky and watchable.
Outside of letting those two loose in over-the-top fashion, “Renfield” struggles to find itself amid the buddy-cop shenanigans, gory ultraviolence and occasional self-discovery. The result is a 93-minute blood-drenched flick that should zoom along with scary-movie momentum but feels like a much longer exercise.
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“Renfield” is essentially a modern-day sequel to the classic 1931 “Dracula,” and courtesy of some fun throwback scenes, it explains how real estate lawyer Robert Montague Renfield took a trip with his family to Transylvania and wound up spending 90 years as Drac’s loyal helper. Renfield finds victims to feed the Count’s appetite (and heal him after ill-fated plans leave him burned and/or in a bad state), though thanks to his master, the put-upon dude gets superpowers when he eats bugs.
Now hanging with Drac in an abandoned hospital in present-day New Orleans, Renfield is getting tired of his job: He attends a therapy group for codependent relationships yet too often has his life derailed by Dracula’s constant needs. One night at a club, Renfield helps save Rebecca (Awkwafina), a strait-laced police officer targeted by powerful yet dim-witted drug dealer Teddy Lobo (Ben Schwartz), and she calls him a hero, giving Renfield needed confidence to finally find his independence. Naturally, this doesn’t fly with his high-maintenance superior, who has grand plans for world domination.
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Directed by Chris McKay (“The Lego Batman Movie”), the movie is in theory what Universal should be doing with its deep bench of legendary monsters – in this case, shifting the spotlight and exploring new themes in a familiar landscape with a side character but still unleashing its main attraction. The workplace dynamic between Dracula and Renfield is bonkers while also completely relatable, and Hoult is a stellar straight man opposite Cage’s silly grandiosity. That in turn makes the good-hearted Renfield’s late-night sojourns for therapy that much more humorous.
But a lot of the movie, which attempts to be many things for many people, upends rather than complements that core relationship. Awkwafina’s Rebecca mostly works, though she’s got her own complicated subplot going on, and same with the supporting villains (who just pale in comparison to Cage’s extravagantly goofy Drac).
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“Renfield” also begs for loads of social satire (watching Dracula and Renfield navigate their way through the 20th century would have been a delight), and instead delivers scenes of excessive cartoonish violence. Dude getting his arms taken off by airborne serving trays and Renfield having trouble keeping his intestines in place are nice touches; once you get to the severed limbs being used as weapons and constantly exploding bodies, the luster is lost.
There’s plenty to sink your teeth into when Cage is this superbly outrageous and manically inspired while Hoult, who’s got great comedic timing, is just as batty in his own way. Everything else about “Renfield” needs to go back in the coffin.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Renfield' review: Nicolas Cage, Nicholas Hoult camp up Dracula
