Renfield (2023)

 

Genre: Horror/Comedy

Time: 1h 35mins

Director: Chris McKay

Quick Summary: Renfield, Dracula's henchman and inmate at the lunatic asylum for decades, longs for a life away from the Count, his various demands, and all of the bloodshed that comes with them.

I found this film to be actually to be super fun and enjoyable. I mean, it isn't amazing, but it's still pretty good at the same time. It is a shame it has such a short run time as I honestly wanted more out of this.

I could tell everyone involved in this was having so much fun. It's wonderfully over the top, managing to blend horror, stylized action, and comedy, but doing so in a way that is so clever and just the right amount. I loved the sharp humour as well, it flowed nicely in between everything and always delivered perfectly. To add to this, I really liked the over-the-top slapstick humour, it wasn't too much and honestly made some of the scenes much better.

Initially, I was worried about the pacing as it was incredibly quick. It is fast, but, It knows when to leave scenes and move on, unravelling the story in a really nice way so you don't get bored. The sad thing is because of this you don't get too much depth into backgrounds or explanations, but honestly it didn't affect my opinion too much as that is not the type of film it wants to be.

Awkwafina has a great dynamic of both silly and serious with her assigned partners, I enjoyed a lot of her scenes and her psychical reactions to things were always fun to see. Overall she was very goofy.

Hoult's really just meshes with so many of the actors really well, he absolutely nailed the role for this. He somehow balanced comedy and gentleness which was interesting to watch, honestly he carried a lot of the movie. I loved how well he meshed with Awkwafina's character, they work really well as a comedy duo. 

Cage felt pushed into the background a lot for me, it was a shame we didn't fully get to see him. Though, when he was shown he fully brought out his comedy side, being over the top, dramatic and silly which was perfect for this role. 

For something that is so silly, at its core, it has a really emotional plot point which I'm sure a lot of people will relate to. It talks about it in both a serious sense and brings out jokes, which I liked. Never feeling insensitive it perfectly balances a topic that can easily be deemed as poor taste.

Hilariously dramatic and full of gore, this is a super fun watch that I would happily watch again.

8/10

"It's never too late to be a hero."