Murphy plays Maximillian (although, of course, he also plays some other characters onscreen), a vampire who arrives in Brooklyn in search of the woman he loves, Detective Rita Veder (Angela Bassett). He gets himself an assistant, Julius Jones (Kadeem Hardison), and starts his attempt to get Veder to fall in love with him almost immediately. That's really all there is to it.
I have to say that I expected the worst when I started watching this. I recall this period not giving us anywhere near the best from Murphy, and Craven was a year away from the film that would push him back up the horror strata and cement his reputation as a provider of quality pop culture content (Scream being that big hit).
This isn't all that bad. It's not fantastic, but it's not all that bad. The biggest problem with it, as you might suspect, is the tone. The comedy often works well enough, but only when everyone involved remembers it can be in the mix. Thankfully, Murphy works well enough while playing his character straight to make it worth your time. He's an excellent vampire, even if he's often just playing a more restrained and old-fashioned version of his usual confident persona.
The script, by Michael Lucker, Chris Parker, and Charlie Murphy, works best when twisting the familiar tropes. Highlights include Hardison's character going from zero to maximum Renfield in super-quick time, a sequence in which Murphy plays a preacher and then has to excuse himself from church, and an ending that actually feels like it belongs in a proper vampire movie. If a bit more of this could have been added, although I have gone blank on specifics (it's early, I need coffee), then the end result would have been even more enjoyable.
Having already praised Murphy for his performance as Maximillian, I'll just say that he's also good when portraying both the aforementioned preacher, and also portraying a low-level hood. The makeup works, as does the fact that he plays these characters for a few key scenes, and not throughout the entire movie in a way that indulges his seeming need to sometimes play everybody onscreen. Bassett is great (when is she not?), and Allen Payne does a solid job of being the Detective working alongside her, and also falling in love with her. Hardison is a lot of fun in his role, especially as soon as he starts to lose body parts, while both John Witherspoon and Zakes Mokae are welcome whenever they're onscreen in their supporting roles.
Maybe my low expectations factored in here, but Vampire In Brooklyn is a good attempt to mix the familiar and the new. The 100-minute runtime means it manages to not overstay its welcome, the cast play well together, and it certainly belongs at this part of Craven's career, when he was trying some different approaches to horror material.
6/10
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