Renfield review: Nic Cage sucks the fun out of What We Do in the Shadows

“I am a codependent.” This line is thrown out emphatically and frequently, coming in voice-over and from multiple characters, throughout Chris McKay’s ineffectual, irony-poisoned vampire splatter comedy Renfield. The confessional is part of the movie’s throughline about people recognizing and taking ownership of the monsters running their lives, but it ends up as a handy reminder of the flavorless pop culture gruel that has dominated the release schedule in recent years. When it comes to Hollywood, we’re all codependents. There are two empty superhero adventures for every well-crafted action movie. There are many franchise entries that go all out for every boldly styled entry.

Even though we are constantly being pounded by an endless stream of images and sounds every time we visit a movie theater, it is still possible to hope that the films will continue to love us, just as we do with our hard-earned money. In some ways, this makes Robert Montague Renfield (Nicholas Hoult) — a doormat of a servant granted eternal life and superhuman combat skills by Count Dracula (Nicolas Cage) — the most relatable Hollywood leading man in ages as he tries to figure out how to escape his master’s mystical grasp. The movie feels completely unintentional, but this is just one thing that makes it funny. Shamefully, even Cage can’t save a role that seems, on paper at least, like it could have been fun.

Universal Pictures Photo

Renfield is bad in a way too many big studio movies are bad, yet it proves to be one of the worst examples of a self-reflexive, pop-culture-referencing modern “property” that plays like a hollow impression of something better. That isn’t an abstract thought: This $80 million monstrosity is desperately calculated as an attempt to play in the same league as The Shadows: What Do We Do?The Vampire Mockumentary (and subsequent FX Series) showcase the everyday lives of bloodsuckers in Wellington, New York.

Where can I find them? ShadowsQuickly establishes an amusing tone, deflating vampire legend, McKay (working from a screenplay by Ryan Ridley), and Ryan Ridley (working with a story written by The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman) can’t nail down either a tone or a central premise for Renfield. The movie’s performances are not serious enough for comedy or dramatic enough to make the film seem a bit campy. Do you imagine the story taking place in a Dracula-protected universe? A secret? A fictional figure until it is revealed to have been real. Who’s to say? The question isn’t broached until an hour into its 90-minute run time, after which every human character has an entirely different reaction to Dracula’s presence, depending on what poorly set-up punchline appears to have been jotted down in Ridley’s first draft. This is assuming that the supporting characters have any reaction shots.

Comedy is hilarious RenfieldThis is not due to human behaviour, but the impersonal delivery of familiar cultural touchstones. This works exactly once, when the movie retells the history of Renfield and Dracula through a particularly innovative flashback, by superimposing Hoult and Cage over Dwight Frye and Bela Lugosi in Tod Browning’s DraculaThe 1931 Universal film classic, ‘The Vampire Hunters of Hollywood’ that established the vampire image in American cinema. From that point on, there’s a chance viewers might even struggle to recognize which lines are meant to be jokes. Take, for instance, a series of extended references to ska music, where the punchline is someone simply mentioning the genre with disdain, a bit that would’ve felt passé in 2016.

Photo: Michele K. Short/Universal Pictures

The framing device, of Renfield attending a New Orleans support group for codependents, has exactly one joke that the movie runs dry and then some: the idea that Renfield’s servitude, involving him repeatedly nursing Dracula back to health by providing him with fresh victims while getting little in return, can be compared to a toxic relationship. But the problem with deploying this comparison in a tongue-in-cheek way is that it isn’t really a comparison to begin with — the way, say, 22 Jump Street draws similarities between the conventions of dating and two undercover detectives having to negotiate a breakup, using terms like “we should investigate other people.”

When it comes to Renfield and the human members of his group, their problems are quite literally the same — unrequited adoration for a manipulative narcissist — so even the movie’s basic setup gets folded into its overarching problem. They are the people who were behind. RenfieldNever have any clue how to approach their material honestly. The double meanings of attempted double entendres are usually singular.

Tyranny of tone and language aren’t the movie’s only problems. The movie’s plot is also half-baked. There are many references to overcome demons, and finding inner strength, but they are rarely used. When Renfield stumbles into an ongoing crime saga — involving Ben Schwartz as a slimy gangster, Shohreh Aghdashloo as his imposing mob-boss mom, and Awkwafina as a straight-laced cop on their tail (a role she plays with exaggerated affectations that never match the material) — a number of fight scenes ensue, though they barely make an impact.

Renfield’s timid demeanor ought to clash hilariously with his penchant for action that lies halfway between martial arts and breakdancing, but that action barely registers with the eye or the brain. The visuals can be described as salad, while the spoken dialog is alphabet soup. Each shot is cut within an inch of its life, so that even when something potentially delightful occurs — some instance of gory blood spatter born from torn limbs, albeit using horrendously subpar digital effects — McKay usually lets it whiz by, rather than holding for more than a fleeting moment on what ought to be grossly funny.

Photo: Michele K. Short/Universal Pictures

The exception is the bang-up practical makeup job applied to Cage when Dracula is a rotting corpse at the start of the film, leaving him in desperate need of Renfield’s help. It’s tactile, and silly in a commendable way — it feels like Dracula’s putrid, pustulating flesh could melt off his bones at any time — but nothing in Cage’s embodiment of the character is nearly as gauche. It’s a mostly one-note performance involving wide-eyed stares and drawn-out delivery. There’s no rhythm to it; no glimmer of mischief, let alone the kind of explosiveness or unpredictability that keeps fans showing up for Cage movies. Renfield won’t end up in any viral Nic Cage montages, and that may be its biggest indictment.

Hoult is appropriately doe-eyed and self-effacing as Renfield — he’s probably the most sincere part of an otherwise cynical project — but he’s the only actor who seems to have been allowed to tap into anything resembling a comedic or dramatic soul. He’s also the only one not saddled with dialogue that plays like amateur improv. He isn’t grating to watch. That’s the bare minimum for an actor on screen, yet it’s a prerequisite that nearly every other facet of RenfieldFrom its mind-numbing, savage action refusing to indulge in laughs or thrills to its scattered story of a man looking for ways to make fun of his boss, it fails to deliver. This should make it the most relatable comedy anywhere in the world. Instead, it’s just a series of disconnected images, strung together by half-baked quips that you could place in the mouth of practically any other character. This would also feel defeating.

RenfieldOn April 14, the debut will be in theatres