Scary Movie Month 2015 Day 28: Transylvania 6-5000

Transylvania 6-5000

I blame Mel Brooks. I grew up watching his movies and listening to his & Carl Reiner's 2000 Year Old Man records over and over and over (and over), so I have a tremendous soft spot for his borscht belt style of comedy. It's silly, it's often infantile, and more often than not it makes me laugh. That combined with a love of monster movies makes me a pretty big fan of this goofball lark written and directed by Rudy De Luca, cowriter of a whole bunch of Brooks' movies (but typically not the good ones). 

Jeff Goldblum (dreamy as always) and Ed Begley, Jr. are tabloid reporters sent to Transylvania by their editor (Norman Fell!) to chase down a Frankenstein story. This leads to all sorts of monstery chicanery as they cross paths with a mad scientist (Joseph Bologna, playing to the cheap seats), a scheming hunchback (John Byner), a sexy vampire (Geena Davis, hooooooooly shit, worth seeing the movie just for her costume) and assorted wacky townsfolk. 

The interplay between Goldblum and Begley is legitimately pretty great, and they manage to wring laughs out of material that really doesn't earn it. Whenever they're offscreen the movie suffers, though Bologna appears to be having fun going so broad and there's charm in that.

Overall it's a tame, harmless, silly little comedy that for some reason (read: Goldblum) has remained on my radar for thirty years. I was in first or second grade when it hit cable, and it was one of those movies that seemed to play almost daily on HBO at that time, but I'm still surprised how fondly I remember it and how well it still works for me. Comedy is just as subjective as horror, and this certainly won't play as well for everyone, but I had a pretty big smile on my face the whole way through. I'd love to have seen what someone with a deft comic touch and genuine affection for horror movies like Brooks could have done with the same material (as a director, De Luca is a pretty decent screenwriter) but at least Goldblum & Begley's chemistry manages to keep it afloat. Also, did I mention Davis' outfit? Because that has also remained a very fond memory for thirty years. Ahem.