Somebody finally fucked up the stoner-comedy genre. With the release of competently hilarious movies like “Harold and Kumar” and “Pineapple Express” it seemed, for a fleeting second, that mainstream filmmakers were willing to intersperse crass humor with a certain level of wit and ingenuity that made the movies enjoyable ?– even sans weed.
But then, as if to remind us of everything we take for granted, out comes “Transylmania,” a 93-minute shambling wreck of a movie that rapes every comedic clich? with such unceasing force that it makes “Meet the Spartans” look like “Candide.”
“Transylmania” puts a fairly convoluted spin on a basic road trip concept — virgin Rusty (played by newcomer Oren Skoog) convinces his group of stoned and horny friends to go to Romania to study abroad at Razvan University, ostensibly as an opportunity to get hella smashed, but actually so he can meet his mysterious sexting buddy Draguta (Irena A. Hoffman, “Four Christmases”). Along the way they meet an evil scientist school dean (David Steinberg, “Epic Movie”), a vampire huntress (Musetta Vander, “Kicking and Screaming”) and an evil vampire count named Radu (also Skoog) who seeks to resurrect his long lost love. Mistaken identities, bathroom humor and sex ensue. If that sounds like the plot of every college comedy ever made, plus vampires, then you’re completely right.
If the movie was a simple cut and dry run-through of that plot it might’ve been excusably bad, but unfortunately, the real horror of “Transylmania” is the multifariousness of its failure. Almost every joke in the movie presumes anything that comes out of the body or allows things to come out of the body is so inherently funny that its mere visual depiction will force laughter. Nearly every joke that occurs becomes a lazy running one — this means everything from groan-inducing vomit jokes, prerequisite crotch injuries and plays on the sexual connotations of words like “bite,” “suck” and “testicles.” When it isn’t beating the shit out of dead horses, “Transylmania” decides to go for live ones. Perhaps the most obvious plagiarism in the movie is found in its ruthless exploitation of classic slapstick movies, predominately “Young Frankenstein.” Pity Mel Brooks, who has to live to see “Transylmania” pay homage to/steal its neighing horse gag (except, of course, with farts this time) — a concept that seemed funny within the context of a clever movie and cheap within a horrible one.
It’s hard to mess up a crass joke to an accepting audience. With competent acting, semi-creative directing or minor creative flourish, any scatological joke can coast on its intrinsic shock value. “Transylmania” has none of these. While the failed delivery of jokes is due largely to the lack of a critical element (humor) the cast makes little attempt to bring any merit to its acting. Which is not to say the cast isn’t dedicated — there’s an exuberant and pitiful energy in the acting — the only problem is that it isn’t funny. Furthermore, for a movie about college students, several of the actors seem to be clearly pushing 30 years old, a bizarre casting oversight that only highlights the lack of effort so palpable in the movie.
The banality of the acting receives no support from the direction. The movie employs a pretty impressive set design considering the average production value allotted to bargain stoner comedies. None of this is utilized — the direction sets up each joke in such an obvious way that it eschews notions like “timing” and “pace” in favor of delivering each joke as an idea of something funny rather than something operating within the movie. It is incredible to consider that this movie took two people to direct (brothers David and Scott Hillenbrand, “Game Box 1.0”). When the nudity finally kicks in it feels like such a pathetic attempt to gain attention that it almost backfires.
In the end, “Transylmania” is nothing more than the hideous bastard child of immaturity and the cynical hope that the mere relation to vampires will strike gold with viewers. It fails as horror because it’s silly, it fails as comedy because it’s lazy and it fails as satire because it’s too inferior to mock something credibly. So what do we have in the end? We have a bit of good breast footage interspersed by a weak plot, flogged forward by forced dialogue and tired jokes. There’s a genre for that, Hillenbrand brothers. It’s called “porn.”
O stars out of 5.
