Back in the late 1800s, Robert Montague Renfield was just an average guy seeking his fortune. He was a real estate agent with the scent of a big land sale filling his nostrils and a wealthy foreign count filling his pockets.
Unfortunately, before you could say, “I never drink … wine,” Renfield was forced to become this powerfully evil man’s manservant. Or maybe just slave. He abandoned his wife and child. He traveled the world, his master’s coffin always in tow. And bugs became the core of his diet. (The crunchy taste isn’t so bad, but the little legs sticking in his teeth have always been a bother.)
Now, all these years later, Renfield is still doing Dracula’s bidding. And his duties are much the same. While the Prince of Darkness hides by day, shadowed away from the corrosive rays of the sun, Renfield scours a modern city looking for victims to sate his master’s ravenous appetite.
Of course, with time and modernity, Renfield has changed his patterns a bit.
Now, instead of simply seeking out the random wandering nun or coach full of innocents, he goes to recovery groups. It’s quite an easy resource, really. He sits and listens to the stories and problems of the lost and abused. And then seeks out these people’s abusers as the next meal for the bloodsucking Dracula.
Dracula doesn’t exactly appreciate those baddie’s tainted, less-than-innocent blood, but sun-fearing bloodsuckers can’t exactly be choosey, either.
There is, however, one little problem: the recovering victims.
As these tormented souls begin to pour out their painful, codependent stories, Renfield begins to see similarities with his own sad situation. He, too, feels lost and mistreated. He, too, feels pain and emotional misery. For hundreds of years, he has suffered so. (And then there are the bugs!)
Is it true that you can learn to stand up for yourself? Can you push back against your abuser? Is there a book, a slogan, a group of caring people who can help him?
Robert Montague Renfield isn’t exactly an average guy anymore. But maybe even he can find a little help.
Renfield meets a struggling young police officer named Rebecca Quincy. And he’s very impressed by her desire to do what’s right in her struggle against the villainous Lobo gang, despite many foes standing against her.
Rebecca inspires Renfield, and he tries to encourage her in turn. “When people like you stop standing up to people like them, that’s when the monsters take over,” he tells her. Rebecca is even willing to be gunned down (as her father once was) rather than succumb to the will of the corrupted cops and local gang members.
Rebecca likewise labels Renfield a hero when he helps others—something that the enslaved man is shocked to hear. The two fight together for good (though there are obvious conflicts in their relationship that they must later confront).
Dracula makes it clear that he is a dark, immortal being. In fact, he calls himself a god and suggests that Renfield (who is briefly strengthened each time he eats a bug) shares in his godlike power. “I am your only salvation,” Dracula tell the beleaguered man. Dracula also gives the benefit of his power boosts to some other characters later on. Dracula’s blood likewise heals several people who have seemingly mortal wounds.
Early on, a vampire hunter and a priest capture Dracula in an unexplained “protection circle.” The priest’s large cross, however, has no effect on the vampire.
The vampire’s only weakness appears to be his flaming helplessness in the face of direct sunlight, which we see several times. And he also makes the point that the “purity” of a good and happy person can be tasted and felt in that person’s blood.
A group of nuns shows up at a local restaurant, and Renfield crosses himself when approaching them. A recovery group meets in a church basement. While gathering weapons to use against Dracula, Renfield notes that he and Rebecca should gather some crucifixes (though they never use them).
Dracula growls “Hail Satan” at one point.
Dracula and the female mob boss of the Lobo gang lightly flirt with each other.
Part of the movie’s “humor” is dependent upon an ongoing bloodbath of gore. Through several battles with crooked police and mob thugs, for instance, Rebecca and Renfield kill people in grossly gushing ways.
Combatants get shot in the head, chest, knee, legs and back by pistols, rifles and shotguns. Arms and legs are sawn and hacked off; a guy’s arms are ripped off and used as spears to impale two other men. Multiple heads are either yanked off, kicked off, or crushed underfoot. Someone gets ripped in half, causing a huge splash of blood. A man has his face torn off; another has the skin stripped from the bones of his hand.
Then there’s Dracula’s carnage. The vampire attacks people as a colony of bats (burning bats, in one instance). He turns into a smoke form and flies down a man’s throat, causing him to explode in a shower of bones, blood and entrails. Dracula rips people open with his sharp nails. The victim’s viscera bulge out of the openings. He also rips out many a throat, chewing the flesh with razor sharp teeth and drinking the blood. And on and on it goes.
We see stacked piles of corpses—either fresh or covered in flies. In a couple cases, the goriness is stepped up even more. For instance, we witness a videogame-like, x-ray view as a man is kicked so hard that his internal bone structure is crushed, organs ruptured, and gore gushes out all his external orifices. In another case, someone is beaten and hacked at by sharp weapons until his body is reduced to small bloody chunks that are then scooped into an open hole.
And on and on it goes, with the bloody death toll ever increasing.
There are just shy of 60 f-words and 20 s-words in the dialogue. Those are joined by multiple uses each of “a–hole,” “b–ch” and “h—.” In addition, God’s and Jesus’ names are abused a total of five times (two of those combining “god” with “d–n”). We hear one crude reference to female genitalia.
Dracula drinks a wine glass full of blood. Later two slightly tipsy women drink margaritas. Thieves snort cocaine. A cop is hit in the face with a bag of the drug, and it breaks open, covering his face in white powder. (Later, the cocaine is used as part of a “protection circle,” a spell-like creation.)
Most of the local cops are on the take and receiving bribes from the Lobo gang.
Here we have a campy comedy about manservant Renfield and his vampiric boss in a modern city—with Dracula being played by an exuberant, over-the-top Nicolas Cage. I mean, what’s not to like?
Well, as it turns out, quite a bit.
Yes, the premise here could offer a certain perverse appeal to fans of vampire stories, especially with Nicolas Cage giving it all the gusto anyone could hope for. (My favorite parts of this flick were when the actor mimics bits of the original Dracula classic.)
Still, the writing here is oh so blah, blah, blah. And that’s just on the aesthetic side of things. Content-wise, Renfield is a veritable gusher, with avalanches of f-words and torrents of gore intended to serve as gross punchlines.
But the bloated and buffoonish blood fest masquerading here as “comedy” just gets old … quicker than a stake to the heart.
After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.
