We saw Renfield. The five minutes of dialogue, about a guy who is easily influenced by narcissists was actually very nicely done. The other 85 minutes of action film were, I suppose, fairly well done if you appreciate the hardcore comic book, slaughterfest style (I was largely ambivalent) but I felt like the ratio of story to action was too extreme to really care about it.
They went “wall of sound” with all of the sound effects so just hearing someone pop their knuckles sounded like a gun was being fired, so that was a bit annoying.
It was hard to take Awkwafina serious as an action figure when she has a permanent slouch. This also influenced my ability to take the romance angle seriously since she didn’t seem like she could tilt her head back enough to look into her partners eyes. The lady needs to see a mobility expert.
For Nicolas Cage, I’m not sure if he’s finally mellowed out a bit, if the frenetic directorial style of the film was so extreme, if the makeup was hampering him, or what but I think the one thing that the movie was relying on for its success was that Cage would magnificently chew all of the scenery as a full-core Dracula. As it was, he was fine, but didn’t really stand out. It was disappointing.
Overall, I’d score a 2.5/5