Renfield (2023) - Cage delivers

If you were around in the nineties then Nicholas Cage was one of the biggest names in Hollywood.  Then came the last twenty years or so when the once great actor made some dubious financial decisions in his personal life which meant he had to star in whatever guff was put in front of him simply in order to pay the bills.  Luckily (for him and the cinema audience), he seems to be more financially stable and can therefore choose his roles a little better.  And here comes 'Renfield.'

Nicholas Cage's name may be higher on the bill (and definitely higher on any promotional material), but it's actually the younger Nicholas (Hoult) who is the centre of the story, playing the long-standing (and long-suffering) assistant to the most evil man alive, Count Dracula himself (ala Nicholas Cage).  Cage doesn't come into it as much as many of us would like, but, when he does, he genuinely steals every scene and is well worth the film's runtime alone.

If the film does have a weakness it's that the parts where Nicholas and Nicholas are too good.  Because there's a sort of sub-plot where a local police officer who is trying to take down the local crime family which has been interwoven within the main supernatural narrative.  I can see how this part of the story fits in with the overall narrative, but it just feels a lot slower and 'normal' compared to the wild over-the-top horror of the main reason people have chosen to watch this film in the first place.

'Renfield' is definitely a 'horror-comedy' as the story shows all the laughably bloody consequences of getting involved with the Prince of Darkness and what day-to-day life working for such a villain is like.  Expect plenty of gore (some of which is disappointingly CGI-heavy) and plenty of laughs.  The more you know about the Dracula legend the more you'll get out of this, but it should fit the bill for everyone from die-hard Cage fans, to the general horror audience.

8/10 The Force is definitely strong with this one