Renfield, a comedic spin-off of sorts of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, focuses not on the count himself but his frazzled, long-suffering servant played by Nicholas Hoult (The Great, The Favourite). Here, Hoult’s lowly Renfield has finally had enough of his toxic work under his boss Dracula (Nicolas Cage) and has even started attending group therapy sessions to deal with his codependency issues. Applying wimpy therapy jargon to the satanic blood-feasting dominance of the world’s most ruthless vampire generates a number of very funny scenes, and both lead actors bring their all to their roles.

It’s no surprise that Cage, reveling in the bleeding edge of performance style that goes way back to his early roles in films like Birdy (1984), Peggy Sue Got Married (1986), Moonstruck (1987), and Vampire’s Kiss (1989), makes an enthusiastically campy meal of playing the Dark One. Decked out in his cape, top hat, cane, and ornate jewelry, he swanks into rooms full of dull, scared, dressed-down contemporary Americans and stuns them all with his aristocratic grandiosity and mesmerizing way of chewing on full sentences as he speaks them. That’s before his eyes turn red and he bares his fangs and goes “full Cage” on the gonzo line, “L-l-l-let’s eat!”

Cage has also made it clear he’s got a big thirst to play the role again, so this movie counts as something of an audition for future work.