Renfield: It'll take a bite outta you!

Renfield (2023) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated R, for appallingly bloody violence, gore, relentless profanity and brief drug use

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.14.23

“Tasteless” isn’t nearly strong enough to describe this deranged little flick.

 

Deplorably, gratuitously tasteless comes closer. 

 

But — forgive me — it’s also hilarious. And quite entertaining.

 

Every time Renfield (Nicholas Hoult, right) tries to show a bit of independence, his
master, Dracula (Nicolas Cage), reminds him — quite painfully — that his fate has
been sealed for a long, long time.

Nicolas Cage has again revived his moribund career, this time by making the extremely risky decision to lampoon himself: a choice that merely accelerated the decline of lesser film stars. But Cage actually has a talent for self-ridicule, as demonstrated by last year’s unexpectedly droll The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent.

And, let’s face it: Who better to sink his baroquely overacting teeth into a modern-day incarnation of Count Dracula?

 

Director Chris McKay, teamed here with writers Ryan Ridley and Robert Kirkman — the latter primarily responsible for the Walking Dead franchise — have orchestrated a cheeky, relentlessly profane and gory take on everybody’s favorite vampire.

 

That said, the infamous Count isn’t really the focus of this tale. That honor belongs to the title character: Dracula’s loyal lackey and aide-de-camp, better known as a “Familiar,” and played to British stiff-upper-lip perfection by Nicholas Hoult.

 

And ya gotta love the premise: Robert Montague Renfield is introduced as a member of a support group for victims of abusive partners, friends and work associates.

 

His presence is twofold. Ostensibly, but without going into detail, he admits to being hyper-controlled by an impressively “toxic boss” (as glaring an understatement as one could imagine). But he’s also on the prowl for fresh victims for ol’ Drac, reasoning that the best way to prevent human monsters from abusing their prey, is to, ah, “introduce” them to his own monster.

 

Since such two-legged blood bags rarely come to Dracula’s lair of their own accord, Renfield is able to, ah, “persuade” them via his own impressively agile and hyper-strong talents, courtesy of just a “touch” of Drac’s powers, which the count bestowed eons ago.

 

These talents kick into gear whenever Renfield eats a bug. (Bram Stolker’s Renfield notoriously ate flies and death’s-head moths. But wasn’t granted super-powers.)

 

Unfortunately, this particularly section of New Orleans — where Dracula and Renfield have set up headquarters in the basement of a long-abandoned hospital — is in thrall to a drug-running crime family run by the ruthless Bellafrancesca Lobo (Shohreh Aghdashloo) and her feckless son, Teddy (Ben Schwartz). When Renfield’s newest, um, “acquisitions” happen to be in the Lobo syndicate’s cross-hairs, all hell breaks loose.

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent: A cheeky romp

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (2022) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated R, for drug use, sexual candor, violence and relentless profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.22.22

Well, color me surprised.

 

Nicolas Cage has been turning out mostly violent stinkers like a man determined to secure a permanent place in the Razzie Hall of Shame: 39 films (!) in the past decade alone — the pandemic didn’t slow him down a jot — and that’s not including the four animated films to which he lent his voice.

 

Although initially wary of collaborating on a movie script with a newbie writer, Nick
(Nicolas Cage, right) finds it hard to resist Javi Gutierrez's (Pedro Pascal) enthusiasm.

Drive Angry, Rage, The Runner, Dog Eat Dog, Army of One, Vengeance, The Humanity Bureau, Between Worlds, Running with the Devil, Prisoners of the Ghostland … the list seems endless. (Honestly, I question whether some of them even achieved cable/satellite/streaming release; they certainly never played in theaters.)

I therefore approached this one with a gimlet eye, particularly since the exploitative advertising campaign gave no reason for optimism.

 

So much for assumptions.

 

Director Tom Gormican’s send-up of Cage — his career, reputation, fan base and constant financial peril — isn’t merely impudently self-referential; this audacious script, co-written by Gormican and Kevin Etten, is the most meta of meta. It’s a cheerfully deranged valentine to the “Cult of Cage,” those touchingly loyal fans — apparently they are legion — willing to forgive even his most deplorable turkeys.

 

This one’s no turkey. It’s actually quite entertaining, and frequently hilarious.

 

We meet Nick Cage (Cage, of course) down on his cinematic luck, desperate for the comeback potential of a film role championed by his perpetually harassed agent, Richard Fink (Neil Patrick Harris). Nick’s personal life is a disaster; his narcissistic megalomania has poisoned his relationships with ex-wife Olivia (Sharon Horgan) and teenage daughter Addy (Lily Sheen).

 

Cage is hard to watch, during these early scenes; his effort to upstage Addy’s 16th birthday is particularly cringe-worthy. He’s also prone to arguing with a younger version of himself — think lanky, long-haired, bomber jacket-garbed Cage Mark 1, from the Raising Arizona/Wild at Heart era — who personifies his worst characteristics.

 

And yes: This display of dual Cages is a deliberate nod to the peculiar twin roles he played in Adaptation. Indeed, identifying all the riffs from Cage’s (better known) earlier films quickly becomes part of the game; some are name-checked, some are film clips being watched by various characters, some are replayed scenes (the one from Leaving Las Vegas being the most obvious).

The Croods — A New Age: Feels somewhat primitive

The Croods: A New Age (2020) • View trailer

Three stars. Rated PG, for mild rude humor

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.27.20

The Croods: A New Age — now playing in whatever theaters are open, and available via video-on-demand closer to Christmas — is akin to its 2013 ancestor … only much more so. 

 

Eep displays her strength by hoisting new best friend Dawn aloft, while the others — from
left, Ugga, Grug, Guy, Hope and Phil — watch with a blend of admiration and concern.

Director Joel Crawford eschews the subtler wit that filmmakers Kirk DeMicco and Chris Sanders brought to the original, instead favoring relentless pacing and a shrieking tone; both prove exhausting before this new film is even half over. These characters rarely chat; they’re always yelling, screaming, bellowing, howling … well, you get the point.

 

We’re once again in an imaginary prehistoric past, set — as DeMicco and Sanders cheekily suggested — somewhere between the Jurassic Age and the “Katzenzoic Era.” The entire voice cast has returned; the cave-dwelling Croods consist of father figure Grug (Nicholas Cage) and his wife Ugga (Catherine Keener); their teenage daughter Eep (Emma Stone), adolescent son Thunk (Clark Duke) and toddler Sandy (still not speaking); and Ugga’s mother Gran (Cloris Leachman).

 

As before, Grug maintains an inflexible set of rules intended to ensure their survival, most notably that the pack (which is to say, the family) Must. Stay. Together. Alas, this is becoming less likely, because Eep and Guy (Ryan Reynolds) — the young man they came across in the first film — have become a serious item, and are thinking about starting their own pack. 

 

It’s every father’s nightmare, and Cage once again is hilarious in full-tilt exasperation mode.

 

This sequel grants Guy a back-story, during a prologue that picks up years before the first film’s events, when — as a young boy — he’s orphaned during a close encounter with a tar pit (a rather grim opening for a family-friendly animated film). His parents’ final words direct him to “follow the light, to find tomorrow,” so the boy wanders … and wanders … and wanders.

 

Along the way, he finds the cuddly three-toed sloth, Belt, that becomes his constant companion and fashion statement. Years pass, and they eventually meet up with the Croods, and so forth.

 

Moving forward, the search for food remains a constant challenge that hasn’t gone well of late. The pack therefore is astonished to discover an idyllic, impressively farmed, food-laden paradise sheltered behind tall wooden walls. This proves to be the home of the aptly named Bettermans: Phil (Peter Dinklage), wife Hope (Leslie Mann) and teenage daughter Dawn (Kelly Marie Tran).

Spider-Men: Into the Spider-Verse — A needlessly tangled web

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG for frantic animated action violence
By Derrick Bang

In today’s pop-culture entertainment world, you can’t have too much of a good thing.

When Marvel’s initial Amazing Spider-Man comic book becomes a smash success, the next move is obvious: Start publishing another dozen (or two) Spider-Man titles. If this cuts into the sales of the character’s flagship title, no matter; the combined overall sales are bound to increase.

Having barely gotten a sense of the whole web-slinging concept, young Miles discovers
that swinging between city buildings is a lot harder than it looks.

And if Spider-Man himself is a major part of the allure, then the next move is equally obvious: Concoct a storyline that creates more Spider-heroes. Thanks to one of sci-fi’s most overworked clichés — the notion of multiple parallel universes, where things are familiar but (tellingly) not quite the same — that’s a snap.

On top of which, the beauty of alternate realities is that writers can do something drastic — such as kill off a beloved character — without damaging continuity in our “core” reality.

The ultimate means of eating one’s cake, and having it too.

But care must be taken. If the original franchise — and character(s) — are diluted too much, everybody loses interest in the whole enterprise.

In fairness, directors Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman have done a mostly commendable job with the animated Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. Rothman and co-scripter Phil Lord deftly navigate the physics-challenged complexities of the alternate universe premise, while granting a solid origin story to a younger, equally captivating, but woefully inexperienced Spider-Man.

That would be Miles Morales (voiced by Shameik Moore), an Afro-Latino teenager who debuted in a complicated 2011 Marvel Comics storyline, and has remained popular enough to earn his own ongoing series.

But he’s not the character with whom this fast-paced, audaciously twisty saga begins. We’re instead (re)introduced to good ol’ Peter Parker, our one and only Spider-Man, who extols his uniqueness during a narrated prologue that cleverly references previous comic book adventures, along with iconic scenes from the live-action films that began in 2002 (most notably that sexy upside-down smooch with Mary Jane).

Poor Peter has his hands full, because the nefarious Wilson Fisk — better known as the Kingpin (Liev Schreiber) — has teamed up with a theoretical physicist, in order to access the “multiverse” for a deeply personal reason. But Peter is enough of a scientist himself, to know that Fisk’s reality-bending device will have drastic consequences, and therefore must be destroyed.

Snowden: A man adrift

Snowden (2016) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated R, for brief nudity and frequent profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.16.16

Oliver Stone’s films have polarized viewers for three decades — ever since 1986’s Platoon — and this one won’t be any different.

Indeed, it’s difficult to find a recent public figure who has divided opinion as much as Edward Snowden (although a current presidential candidate comes close).

Having assembled their information into a series of revelatory articles ready for publication,
the team of unlikely conspirators — from left, documentarian Laura Poitras (Melissa Leo),
Edward Snowden (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), and Guardian journalists Glenn Greenwald
(Zachary Quinto) and Ewan MacAskill (Tom Wilkinson) — discuss, via teleconference,
how best to release the stories.

Stone’s dip into these tempestuous waters — he also co-wrote the script, with Kieran Fitzgerald, based on material gathered from books by Luke Harding and Anatoly Kucherena — isn’t likely to change any minds. Neither will this film’s slant surprise anybody familiar with Stone’s über-liberal proclivities. No question: This is a sympathetic, strawberry-lensed portrait of  — depending on your point of view — one of our country’s most heinous traitors, or one of its most conscientious whistle-blowers.

The issue itself also frustrates fence-sitters. Civil liberties types, with a healthy respect for George Orwell, fear the totalitarian potential of an unchecked government Big Brother. Those favoring security — at any cost — argue that such a position is naïve, at a time when headlines are dominated by the grotesque behavior of terrorists who operate outside of national boundaries.

In fairness, Stone’s film carefully takes no position in that particular argument. The primary goal of any mainstream drama, even one drawn from actual events, is to give a (hopefully) talented cast the opportunity to inhabit engaging characters involved in a compelling storyline.

In this respect, Snowden succeeds, in great part because of Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s thoroughly convincing portrayal of the title character. Viewers exiting the theater may not agree with Snowden’s actions, but the emotional and philosophical journey that gets him there is presented thoughtfully and persuasively (assuming, of course, that we accept Harding and Kucherena’s vision of the man).

Thematically, this film echoes Stone’s depiction of Ron Kovic, in 1989’s Born on the Fourth of July. In both cases, we’re introduced to young, true-blue American patriots — believers in baseball, motherhood and apple pie — who shed their idealism slowly, reluctantly, but then completely ... and only after coming to the conclusion that People In Authority have lied to them, and to everybody, for too long.

Stone opens his film in a plush Hong Kong hotel in the spring of 2013, as Snowden takes his first meeting with documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras (Melissa Leo) and Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald (Zachary Quinto); they’re soon joined by the Guardian’s defense and intelligence correspondent, Ewan MacAskill (Tom Wilkinson). They’ve assembled to help Snowden “finesse” the disclosure of his stolen classified documents, in a very public manner that will prevent the U.S. government from spinning the revelations into something insignificant.

And, not incidentally, to minimize the chances that Snowden might get kidnapped and/or killed.

(Poitras actually preceded this film by two years; her 2014 documentary on Snowden, Citizenfour, won an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, along with a slew of other national and international honors.)

The Croods: Stone Age family frolic

The Croods (2013) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rating: PG, and needlessly, as this film is fine for all ages
By Derrick Bang

Although the enormously successful Ice Age franchise would seem to have captured the market for animated features set in prehistoric times, that series has focused exclusively on animals, while ignoring the early stirrings of humanity.

Clearly, that oversight begs to be addressed, and The Croods does so with considerable humor: much of it derived from the cheekily anachronistic manner in which these characters interact with an environment that never quite existed in our own past. Writer/directors Chris Sanders and Kirk DeMicco have set their saga — in their own words — somewhere between the Jurassic Age and the “Katzenzoic Era” ... which explains the colorful assortment of birds, reptiles and mammals that we’re unlikely to find in the fossil record.

Think of television’s The Flintstones, although considerably more primitive, and with a lot more attitude.

The Croods can be transfixed by the simplest things, and so we frequently see
expressions of awe fill the faces of, from left, Gran, Eep, Grug, Thunk, Sandy and
Ugga. And things get even better when they meet the new neighbor...

Our family is composed of a father figure, Grug (voiced by Nicholas Cage), who does his best to preserve the safety of his mate, Ugga (Catherine Keener); their adolescent son, Thunk (Clark Duke); and toddler Sandy (not really talking yet). The clan also includes Grug’s mother-in-law, Gran (Cloris Leachman); and typically rebellious teenage daughter Eep (Emma Stone).

At first blush, it wouldn’t seem that Eep has much to rebel against, but in fact her home life has become insufferably claustrophobic. The Croods once shared their valley with several other family units, all of which have perished, often in some larger predator’s stomach.

As a result, the iron-handed Grug has issued a series of edicts that allows his family only two activities: foraging for food, and hunkering for safety in a dark cave. He regards their continued existence as proof that his various credos are the height of wisdom: Fear is good, change is bad; Anything fun is bad; and Never not be afraid.

A rather stifling set of rules, particularly for a headstrong and curious young woman who wants to live, and see more of her world.

Following a brief explanatory prologue, in order to set the stage, Sanders and DeMicco open their story with a frenetic set piece: a typical egg hunt, in order to secure breakfast. This hilarious sequence has the rip-snortin’ pace of a classic Warner Bros. cartoon short, with Alan Silvestri’s equally tumultuous score further propelling the action. I promise, you’ll gasp for breath, mostly from laughing so hard.

It’s a great way to introduce these six characters, and their dangerous environment.

The Sorcerer's Apprentice: Hocus-pocus, little focus

The Sorcere's Apprentice (2010) • View trailer for The Sorcerer's Apprentice
Three stars (out of five). Rating: PG, for fantasy violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.15.10
Buy DVD: The Sorcerer's Apprentice • Buy Blu-Ray: The Sorcerer's Apprentice (Three-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo+Digital Copy)

Taking note of the Disney logo embellishing the title credits, a fellow film critic at last week's preview screening idly wondered aloud if this new, live-action Sorcerer's Apprentice would in any way reference the famous Mickey Mouse sequence in 1940's Fantasia. 

Surely not, I protested, although the thought — along with my knowledge of the Mouse House's willingness to strip-mine its own heritage in misbegotten projects such as 2003's The Haunted Mansion — left me uneasy. 

At first, Dave (Jay Baruchel, right) finds it difficult to take Balthazar's
(Nicolas Cage) mystical pronouncements all that seriously, but the
college student's doubts vanish after he's nearly eaten by a huge
dragon, then nearly blasted into unconsciousness by a nasty
magician bent on destroying the world. Dave may be slow, but he
ain't stupid...

Then, horror of horrors, as young Dave Stutler (Jay Baruchel) eyed the mess left in his ludicrously opulent underground laboratory, and happened to glance in the direction of a mop, our worst fears were realized. Cue the familiar fanfare from composer Paul Dukas' "L'Apprenti Sorcier," and the mop came to life, along with every other scrubbing and cleaning utensil in evidence. 

That was pretty much the point at which this Sorcerer's Apprentice lost its way. 

Mind you, the road had been rocky even before this point. Light-hearted adventure films run the risk of becoming too frivolous, at which point malevolent villains lose most of their edge. Alfred Molina deserves considerable credit, throughout this somewhat scattered story, for maintaining his nasty side as the dread Maxim Horvath, but the script — credited to five (!) hands — undermines his performance at every opportunity. 

This Sorcerer's Apprentice is the sort of product that Disney concocts with considerable flair: a family-friendly romp that moves rapidly, looks pretty cool most of the time, and conceals its narrative deficiencies with engaging characters never at a loss for witty repartee. Producer Jerry Bruckheimer, director Jon Turteltaub and star Nicolas Cage are veterans of the National Treasure franchise; they know how to deliver a reasonably good time. 

But this narrative attempts to cover a lot of territory, with some highly visible missteps. Like Dave himself, a young man who suffers a ragged childhood as a result of his first encounter with Balthazar Blake (Cage), this film doesn't quite know what to be, when it grows up. Young children will be diverted by all the flash and bang, but teen and adult companions are apt to exchange glances laden with skeptically raised eyebrows. 

Kick-Ass: Quite a kick!

Kick-Ass (2010) • View trailer for Kick-Ass
Four stars (out of five). Rating: R, for sexual candor, relentless profanity, violence and gore, much involving a young child
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.22.10
Buy DVD: Kick-Ass • Buy Blu-Ray: Kick-Ass (Three-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + Digital Copy)

OK, pop-culture junkies of all ages: Send your parents out of the room for awhile, 'cause they will not like what I have to say about this film.

Kick-Ass is yet further proof that polite society — the civilized world as we know it — is going straight to hell.

Having been tracked back to his lair -- ah, his bedroom -- by the mysterious
Hit-Girl (Chloe Grace Moretz) and Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage, right), the
mostly uncostumed Dave (Aaron Johnson) is warned of the necessity to get a
bit smarter, before tackling some real villains. The result of this unusual pep
talk is certain to involve lots of blood, severed limbs and socially
unacceptable carnage ... and isn't that why you're buying a ticket in the
first place?

And I'm hanging on for dear life, enjoying every moment of the explosive ride.

In a word, this flick rocks.

Avid comic book fans need no introduction to this series by co-creators Mark Millar and John Romita Jr., which raised eyebrows as it took the industry by storm in 2008. Even in a medium known for shocking excess, this book's breathtaking blend of teenage angst and hyper-violence became legendary almost overnight.

Nobody could have expected — heck, nobody could have imagined — that such electrifying sensibilities would remain intact during a transition to the big screen. Several other equally popular graphic novels have made the jump before, with mixed results; even devoted admirers will acknowledge that (for example) the film adaptations of V for Vendetta and Watchmen are flawed.

Not so with Kick-Ass.

Director/co-producer/co-scripter Matthew Vaughn deserves a great deal of credit for his impressively faithful rendition of this splatter masterpiece. It's not merely a matter — with co-scripter Jane Goldman — of reproducing much of Millar's dialogue verbatim; Vaughn and production designer Russell De Rozario made their film look like much of Romita's comic book art. Memorable single panels are reproduced perfectly, as is the overall tone of this universe so much like ours.

That helps the palatability factor; it's a bit easier to find the gallows humor in a visual palette dominated by bright primary colors ... which you expect from a story involving folks in glitzy costumes.

Goodness, the film even kicks off with the comic's same prologue, which results in a rather unexpected outcome for "some Armenian guy with a history of mental problems." And with an opener like that, we know the rest of the film is in good hands.

National Treasure: Book of Secrets — Sophomoric fun

National Treasure: Book of Secrets (2007) • View trailer
3.5 stars (out of five). Rating: PG, for powder-puff violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.3.08


Hollywood hokum doesn't get much sillier than National Treasure: Book of Secrets.

Having discovered and ventured into a hitherto unknown chamber beneath
Mount Rushmore, our heroes — from left, Patrick (Jon Voight), Ben (Nicolas
Cage), Emily (Helen Mirren) and Abigail (Diane Kruger) — are about to have
an unpleasantly close encounter with way too much running water. Just an
average day, for our intrepid treasure-seekers...

That said, this 21st century riff on Boys' Own Adventure Stories should play well with folks not willing to wait for masters Spielberg and Ford to unveil the long-awaited fourth entry in the way-similar Indiana Jones franchise.

Boasting impressively opulent production design — Dominic Watkins, take a bow — and an aggressive pace that minimizes the time during which we might contemplate the script's numerous lapses in logic, this return visit from Nicolas Cage's honorable treasure hunter is pure escapist fun: certainly not a bad thing, for families seeking movie thrills during the waning days of the holiday season.

Book of Secrets is a well-mounted "good time at the movies" that exploits enough actual history to qualify for a public service merit badge ... which is appropriate, since Cage's Benjamin Franklin Gates is the ultimate boy scout: a do-gooder to the core, forever willing to think the best of friends and enemies alike, even when circumstances call for a bit more healthy cynicism.

And when we reach this film's equivalent of Superman's "truth, justice and the American way" speech, Cage delivers it with a solemn eloquence that makes us believe, if only for a few seconds, that solid moral values do still have a place in American society.

Cage is great at that sort of stuff; he projects a guileless sincerity — a puppy dog frankness — that begs us to trust him. And why not? His Ben Gates demonstrated the highest level of integrity during his first adventure, and we've no reason to expect any less here.

Indeed, director Jon Turteltaub (back from the first film) and a legion of eight (!) credited screenwriters and an equal number of producers (!!) have ensured that the formula doesn't stray a jot from what worked the first time. Granted, the one-liners may be a little more James Bondishly smart-assed, but otherwise this is business as usual.