Renfield should have been a slam-dunk of a film, instead it only barely stays afloat thanks to a hammy and delightful performance by Nicolas Cage. Nicholas Hoult, Awkwafina, and Ben Schwartz provide a lot of fun as well to a film that suffers from an identity crisis. One moment it’s over-the-top silly, the next it’s serious and dramatic, and then it becomes a gory action film. The film never quite settles on what it wants to be but thanks to strong performances and a good sense of fun it’s worth the watch.
The film serves as a sequel to the 1931 Dracula film with Cage as Count Dracula and Hoult as the eponymous Renfield. There is a really inspired sequence at the beginning of the film where Cage and Hoult recreate scenes from the 1931 vampire flick, and it’s wonderful. Part of me wished we could have just had a whole black-and-white film with Cage as Dracula. This film begins as Renfield and Dracula move to New Orleans where the Count must regain his strength after a near-death experience. Renfield tries to justify his duties of bringing his narcissistic master human prey by going after bad guys. The kind of guys that like to emotionally abuse and show their power, you know, guys like Dracula.
One day Renfield decides he’s had enough and wants to live a normal life, he even gets a very ugly apartment. Unfortunately for him, his path of death and destruction has caught the attention of New Orleans police officer Rebecca Quincy (Awkwafina) and mobster Teddy Lobo (Schwartz). Things don’t as planned and Renfield is forced to confront his toxic relationship with his boss. There is some great fun to be had in seeing Dracula dealing with mobsters and cops in modern-day New Orleans. The juxtaposition of these early 20th-century characters with modern cops and mobsters is a delight. The film just doesn’t get to it until almost too late.
The beginning of the film is a mess. There’s a clunky voice-over that over explains the set-up, and persists throughout the film. It keeps taking you out of the film and reminding you that this isn’t a serious movie. This is fine, not all movies need to be serious, but this film couldn’t figure out if it wanted to be or not. It jumps all over the place in tone and pacing, which could explain why the film has three credited editors. In the beginning, the editing is overdone, with cuts coming at you faster than you can comprehend. Each scene just whizzes by in a blur without any chance to emotionally connect with the audience. Then the film slows down to let Cage ham it up as Dracula. There are some emotional stakes established and then we go right back to the frantic editing and pacing.
The tone is also a mess, with the action sequences so bloody and over-the-top it’s almost cartoonish. Heads fly off, blood sprays everywhere, and bodies are dismembered in excessive fashion. But then we lose the stylized filmmaking and return to traditional cuts and camera angles, before whipping back to moving cameras and frantic pacing. Even the script feels like it doesn’t know the story it wants to tell. Is this movie about stopping Dracula from taking over the world with the assistance of mobsters? Or is this film about Renfield reconciling with all of the terrible things he has done over the years? Or is it a B-movie comedy about Dracula and Renfield living in the year 2023? The screenplay simply says yes.
With a brief hour-and-a-half run time the film never truly has a chance to explore any of these topics and instead insists on trying to cram it all in. This all leads to tonal inconsistency, poor pacing, and some logic issues that are just brushed over. Characters get from one place to another with no explanation and other characters seem to know where people are located despite having no indication that they would know what. It leaves you feeling a bit puzzled and wondering if there were some scenes left on the digital cutting room floor.
The actors are the saving grace of this film, especially Cage. His Dracula is egocentric, slightly unhinged, and beyond delusional. Cage plays the vampire as if he was still in the 1931 film with the theatricality of a stage-to-screen actor. He is clearly having a great time playing Dracula and it shows. He sinks his teeth (pun intended) into the role and has fun with it. His scenes opposite Hoult are a delight and watching the two interact is never dull. Hoult does well as Renfield too, bringing innocence and vulnerability to the tortured character. He makes you root for him and hope that he can escape Dracula’s clutches. Awakwafina is funny as usual and her signature brand of humor does a lot for this film.
There is a lot of fun to be had with the film, from the performances to the humor, and the ridiculous action sequences. This is a film that had a lot of potential going for it but a weak script, some messy editing, tonal inconsistencies, and poor pacing almost do it in. If it wasn’t for the actors and some of the humor this film would have undead on arrival. Is it a bad film? No, not at, it could have just been so much better.
3/5