This movie is dead enough

DRACULA: DEAD AND LOVING IT (1995)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Revised review from 1996

Funnyman Mel Brooks was at his peak with parodies of specific genres like "Blazing Saddles," "Young Frankenstein" and "Spaceballs," and the underrated gems that include "High Anxiety" and "Silent Movie." But something became amiss after "Spaceballs" when he failed to truly exploit parodying Robin Hood and his Merry Men of Sherwood in "Robin Hood: Men in Tights," a spectacularly dim and progressively unfunny movie that spent more time mocking Errol Flynn's version than Costner's version. Still, nothing in "Men in Tights" compares to the terminal stupidity of "Dracula: Dead and Loving It," using the absurdly cast Leslie Nielsen as Count Dracula mimicking Bela Lugosi's iconic Hungarian accent. Using Nielsen in this film is useful only in reminding us how much better he was in "The Naked Gun" parodies. It would've been wonderful to cast Frank Langella, who played the Count in the 1979 "Dracula" version, because utilizing Langella's nuanced comic gifts (harkening all the way back to Langella in Mel Brooks' own "Twelve Chairs") could've given this film a necessary lift from its own muted and deadly boring comic rhythms. 

The story in this film closely follows Lugosi's 1931 classic as Dracula parades into England with insect-eating Renfield (Peter MacNicol - an actor unsuitable for comedy as proven with "Ghostbusters II") at his side. Mel Brooks plays a thick-accented Van Helsing, the sleepwalking Harvey Korman plays Dr. Seward and where is Cloris Leachman as Frau Blucher when you really need her? And why bring in Steven Weber and Amy Yasbeck from TV's "Wings" when they are given nothing comedic to do? A sure sign of comic desperation: the movie has repetitive scenes of geysers of blood shooting up from corpses. Once, twice, three times too many.

Mel Brooks does pepper the screen with a couple of highlights that are bound to be missed. Most notable is a subtle nod to Scorsese's "The Age of Innocence" but nothing comes of it (it involves opera glasses). I liked the Anne Bancroft cameo where she plays a demanding gypsy which is a particular nod to Maria Ouspenskaya from Lon Chaney's "The Wolf Man." But are audiences going to get the in-jokes and references to Christopher Lee and the myriad Hammer Horror films? I doubt it. Jokes targeting Coppola's version of the good old Count are abysmal. Dracula's ridiculous hair net is actually a...hat! Ha!

"Dracula: Dead and Loving it" basically retells the 1931 film's story without much comic ingenuity - it practically plays it straight. Mel Brooks has gone on to producing some of his best films into musicals. This last directorial effort is splashy blood gags and little else.