Here's one to ponder: has Mel Brooks gotten too old to be as funny as he used to be or
has his core audience of aging Baby Boomers gotten too old for his Borscht Belt-tinged
humor? This mildly amusing spoof of Bram Stoker's famous vampire story dies after about
half an hour. Leslie Nielsen makes a commanding Count in his cape and Liberace pompadour
and Peter MacNicol swipes scene after scene as the cackling bug-eater, Renfield. And rest
assured, Brooks' version is a lot funnier than the Coppola version and a million times
better than his wretched Robin Hood spoof, "Men in Tights." But there's something missing
here, something that suggests writer/director Mel Brooks is either stuck in a '70s sense
of outrageousness or simply lost interest somewhere in the middle of his movie. And
compared to the barrage-o'-gags style set by the "Airplane" movies, this one seems almost
creaky.
"Dracula" makes you worry that Mel's career may be dead and he's not loving it.
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