Hotel Transylvania: Transformania: Movie Review

Cast: Brian Hull, Selena Gomez, Andy Samberg 

Director:  Jennifer Kluska, Derek Drymon

Drac's back in the fourth Hotel Transylvania outing which has bypassed cinemas thanks to Covid-19 and is making its bow on Amazon Prime Video.

In this latest, the Hotel Transylvania is celebrating its 125th anniversary and Drac's planning to retire and hand the keys to the hotel onto his beloved Mavis (Gomez, all Gothic snark and dry delivery).

But in a last minute panic, and fearful of what Mavis' other half, the hippyish Johnny (Samberg), would wreak on the hotel, Drac backtracks, claiming there's a law that no one other than monsters can take over the hotel. 

So Johnny turns to Van Helsing for help - and Van Helsing offers him his Monsterification Ray. However, things go haywire, and soon Johnny's a monster, but Drac has been turned into a human and the two of them are thrust into an adventure in South America to find a vital component for Van Helsing's ray gun before the change becomes permanent.

With no Adam Sandler resuming Drac duties, it falls to Brian Hull to try and anchor the latest Hotel Transylvania movie, which becomes ever more fractured as it juggles different storylines and locations. 

The animation may be slick, and there are certain manic touches thrown in by Genndy Tartovsky's input into the script, but Hotel Transylvania: Transformania certainly feels like a formulaic film which offers solid, but rapidly diminishing returns to anyone over the age of 4.

With its "If you only ever see the worst in things, you'll miss the best" mantra probably being one that's fairly resonant in Covid-19 times, Hotel Transylvania: Transformania makes a reasonable argument for existence, thanks to some inspired moments of both lunacy and animation. But it makes no strong argument for the continuation of the franchise, or for why it should steal 100 minutes of your life.

The younger end of the audience may easily be amused for the 100 minutes run time thanks to some silly manic edges, but certainly the adult end of the audience will find their patience tested by the general feeling that at times, Hotel Transylvania: Transformania is simply doing nothing more than padding its run time.

Hotel Transylvania: Transformania streams on Amazon Prime Video from January 14.