Renfield: "Thank you Wiccan tumblr."

★★ 1/2

The first thing I noticed about Renfield didn't have anything to do with the movie itself, but with the audience. I haven't heard a movie theater laugh as much or as in sync as the audience of my screening of this movie did. And if I was basing this review purely on my own enjoyment, there would be 5 stars on this page no question.

We meet Renfield, our charmingly tragic protagonist played with earnest by Nicholas Hoult, at a support group meeting for victims of abusive relationships. Trying to put a good mark on the world that his master is hellbent on destroying, Renfield hunts down the abusers from the aforementioned group and delivers them to Dracula, played with vigor and true, potent malice by Nicolas Cage. When one of these hunts goes wrong, Renfield finds himself entangled in the web of a New Orleans crime family- which features a live-action cartoon character of a mob boss in Ben Schwartz- and vindictive traffic cop Rebecca Quincy, played by Awkwafina.

What Works:

For a movie that I was admittedly expecting to be so much worse, Renfield swung for the fences and knocked it out of the park in a lot of ways, one of the best parts being how fresh the take was. This version of Dracula and Renfield is obviously a departure from the source material, but most notably in their origins. We find out about halfway through that this Renfield chose to work for Dracula, rather than being coerced, tortured, and hypnotized like in the original story.

Therefore, setting up Renfield and Dracula's dynamic as an abusive relationship with the backdrop of the support group is a choice that surprises just as much as it delivers. Hoult's performance is given depth as he realizes that he's the only one to blame for the mistakes he's made, and Cage delivers a nuanced performance as a toxic and controlling partner, relying on subtly twisting the knife and manipulating Renfield rather than resorting to over-the-top villainy in every interaction. A sobering moment for anyone rooting for Renfield throughout- which Nicholas Hoult makes very easy to do- comes from a confrontation between him and his master, where Cage pulls the final punch about Renfield abandoning his wife and young daughter: "you're the monster Renfield, not me."

As can be expected, Nicolas Cage's performance as Dracula is masterful: anything you've heard about how good he is in this, triple it. As much as he makes you laugh, sipping blood from a martini glass and coming up with outlandish plans for world domination, he makes you genuinely cower, switching between both the humor and the malevolence of a man who thinks he can't lose at a moment's notice. I fear it's the role he was born to play.

What truly pushed Renfield over the edge was the design. From the gruesome special effects makeup of Cage's slowly healing Dracula, to the vibrant underbelly and neon lights of New Orleans and the Mulates club, to Dracula's horrific hospital lair and his throne of blood bags, Renfield is a breath of fresh air as modern cinema grows increasingly darker and duller.

What Doesn't:

One of the most disappointing things about Renfield is that there are so many things left to be desired. For every one great thing that works, there are two things that don't. Granted, there were areas I already expected to be lacking: corny dialogue, forced plot lines. But this movie was so full of chicken fat that we lost the real magic, which rested squarely on the shoulders of Hoult and Cage.

Ben Schwartz's incompetent mob kid Teddy Lobo was essentially Jean-Ralphio from Parks and Rec with a gun, when his trademark outrageousl humour could've been used to do so much more. The tenuous connection between Renfield and the New Orleans police makes Awkwafina's already unfunny performance as Rebecca Quincy, clean-cut cop looking to avenge the death of her father, even worse.

Renfield himself admits to this very issue in one of his final fights with Teddy, where he matter of factly observes "we've barely met twice." It's meant to be a tongue-in-cheek breaking of the fourth wall, but it speaks to the real issue with the movie: its disjointedness. Renfield had the chance to be great, but its supporting cast falls flat in stereotypical roles and predictable plots, and the one character that Renfield has a true chemistry with we see far too little of.

In the fight scene that brings us Renfield and Rebecca's first interaction, Renfield uses a tray to grotesquely cut the arms off one of the thugs attacking them- one of many outlandish acts of violence that drew a gasp and a giggle from the theater. Not 2 minutes later, Rebecca interrupts a shy Renfield's introduction to ask him, "did I just watch you cut a guy's arms off with a decorative serving platter?" It took the wind out of the sails of the joke- it felt like the creative team doubling back to make sure we head really gotten the gag before we could move forward.

The genuine disservice to Renfield was that it didn't trust the good things it had to stand alone.

Final Thoughts:

Like its titular character, Renfield lacks direction. Its gory, colorful excess could have easily put it in the realm of camp, but it was just a touch too self-aware. Nicolas Cage's exceptional performance as Dracula had me clutching the arms of my chair at times, but we spent too little time with him to call it a horror. If anything, I think Renfield is a truly bizarre coming of age story, but had it cut the crust off the story and trusted the strength of its main characters it could've been so much more.

That being said, we don't need to know exactly where we're going to enjoy the ride with Renfield. This movie is a lot of things, but it is not boring. The special effects are cartoonish and compelling, the costuming and makeup bring the story to a whole other level, and Cage and Hoult's dynamic makes for a hilarious and at times heartbreaking journey. Most importantly though, it's absolutely a love letter to the classics, as anachronistic as it is.

From the moment we begin the introductory black and white callback to Bela Lugosi's 1931 Dracula, it's clear this movie was made with a passion for the source material in mind- and there's nothing better than watching something that was made with passion.

Plus, I'd rather watch something colorful, fun, and different that falls a little flat over a movie that takes itself too seriously for the sake of being serious and misses the mark in the process.

I have to lastly issue a sincere thank you to whoever made the decision to put Na Na Na (Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na) by My Chemical Romance in the soundtrack. You don't know it, but you did that for me.