After his wife died in 1895, Dracula (Sandler) built a secret hotel for monsters that was impossible for humans to find. But over a century later, just as his cloistered daughter Mavis (Gomez) prepares to celebrate her 118th birthday, goofy backpacker Jonathan (Samberg) stumbles in. Since he has always told Mavis that humans are evil, Dracula disguises Jonathan as a party-planner cousin of Frankenstein (James). But Jonathan unwittingly gives Mavis a glimpse of the exciting world outside, which she decides to go discover. Which is something her father desperately wants to avoid.

Yes, it's that fairly simplistic "follow your dreams" and "rise to your potential" story, but it's energetically invigorated by the wacky characters, including Wayne (Buscemi) the wolf, Griffin (Spade) the invisible man and Murray (Green) the mummy. All of them have marriage and family issues to add to the general on-screen chaos, which allows the filmmakers to drop throwaway sight gags and rude one-liners into every scene. It's too frantic, but it keeps us chuckling all the way through.

And there are some inspired bits, including a hilariously grim bingo game and a climactic showdown the town monster festival. There are also zombie bellhops, housekeeping witches and a full array of poo and fart jokes. Plus a witty Twilight gag. All of which keeps the sentimental storyline in check, as it rather lightly touches on the killjoy older generation ("Why do all the wrong people get to be immortal?" Jonathan whines) and how controlling parents can stifle their children.

The filmmakers even throw some scary imagery at the screen, including plenty of riotous grisliness. The vocal cast give performances that are packed with personality, even if some characters are rather broad. And the animators keep things visually whizzy, with lots of inventive effects even if the characters look somewhat plasticky. And since the movie is so packed with wit and energy, we don't really mind any of that.

themes, violence, vulgarity

23.Sep.12