Renfield follows the story of Dracula’s lackey who is tired of his job of pleasing his master until he does fall in love with a fiesty cop. What happens next? The story here does tick all the right boxes as far as a horror comedy is concerned. And this was one reasons that had made me excited and curious for Renfield in the first place. But one look at the length of the film did make me worry and all my fears did come true in its screenplay that does flatter to deceive. Standing at just a shade under 90 minutes, the screenplay is fast moving alright but it turns out to be pretty rushed and filled with cardboard characters that do not quite leave the desired impact. And this was a shame because the potential was there to make something even more fascinating.

The drams does open with the introduction of the protagonist at the therapy center. A quick flashback does set the ball rolling wherein you are introduced to the Dracula and his actions that he is capable of. This was a good beginning for me, considering that there was a streak of dark humour prevalent in an otherwise gory sequence that definitely did its bit in raising the excitement with respect to the rest of the drama. But there was an immediate stutter post that, with the writing getting a little disjointed. While things do fall in place, I would have liked some sort of world building to allow the viewers time to invest in the proceedings and the characters. In fact, these rushed events did remind me of the Hindi film Kuttey that had so much potential, yet it couldn’t quite rise from its written material.

To be fair, the proceedings do have their moments and are extremely watchable. But I just couldn’t get myself emotionally invested in the drama. So while people are torn apart, I did remain unflinched and was almost just going through the motions. There should have been some levels of creating characters in a world which did have the potential to be fascinating. But the cardboard characters just failed to create any impact. The conflicts introduced were rushed through as well. The drama did come to a point where it was neither a horror nor a comedy, which did bring me to think what a tricky proposition it actually is to balance the genre.

The events leading up to the final act also did seem rushed. With barely any twists and turns and the drama following a “familiar” note, I did feel letdown quite a bit. Even the final act was alright thus summing up the screenplay which was half-baked despite a good premise and concept.