I, Frankenstein

Jul 08, 2014

Man, I heard this was a serious stretch, but Apple must be running out of ideas if it’s going to create some kind of iFrankenstein product. Lame jokes aside, first, the super-stylish Danny Boyle directs the 2011 “Frankenstein” play, and now we have this, so I reckon it’s finally time for Frankenstein to come into the modern entertainment world. I don’t know about you, but I’m just glad that the bored, middle-aged housewives trying to impress teenaged girls didn’t get ahold of this property, you know, again (Hey, 21 was middle-aged back in Mary Shelley’s day), so, as a man, I’ll take this, even though it is lame and, perhaps on purpose, an unholy fusion of some dead neo-supernatural film franchises. It’s “Underworld” meets “Blade”, except there is a distinction: it doesn’t have vampires, which is bogus, because now that Aaron Eckhart is mad and deformed to the max, he’s ready to take on some batmen. Jokes aside, Eckhart is taking this a little too seriously, even though he’s probably not going to get any more attention for this than Kevin Grevioux is, because even though co-wrote the graphic novel upon which this film is based, and actually in this film, I mean, no more than the amount of people who read the graphic novel in question is going to remember this film. Nonetheless, excitement is still in the air, because Tom Rosenberg, Gary Lucchesi and Richard Wright hit two bats with one stone when they produced “Underworld” and took on vampires and werewolves, but now they’re ready to take on the Stein, baby, so maybe they’ll make a better “Mummy” film when they join the franchise for the next installment, so long as it’s not like this film. Lakeshore has put out some pretty good stuff, but make no mistake, this is less “Million Dollar Baby” and more “The Six Million Dollar Man”, or rather, “The Sixty-Five Million Dollar Man” (That might be too much to rebuild this man, let alone this franchise), all fluff, though not much payoff, despite some undeniable strengths.

Although it has its flat spots, and is made fairly awkward by the showcasing of new advancements in frame rate technology which limit realistic motion blurs, Ross Emery’s cinematography is fairly handsome in its neo-gothic chill, which supplements some reasonably memorable visuals, complimented by visual effects that are often flimsy, but just as often fair in their rendering, and consistently colorful in their flashy concept. Needless to say, the technical flash really sparks during action sequences that, no matter how well-framed and questionably drawn in staging and technicality, mark heights in entertainment value through generally tense and tight staging that thrives on Stuart Beattie’s direction. I suppose action is most consistently commendable aspect to Beattie’s direction, which is an often baffling mess (Seriously, even the framing is often off), yet not exactly to where the final product collapses as contemptible, thanks to certain highlights in direction which range from lively orchestrations of style, to gaining a tight enough grip on pacing to provide fun moments amidst a consistent degree of mild entertainment value. Oh, no, there is no shred of genuine dramatic resonance, and that, coupled with more than a few embarrassing missteps in and, of course, slow spells to storytelling, really do a number on entertainment value, but color is never truly lost, partly because the direction always has fluff on its side, and largely because the story concept itself is admittedly kind of interesting. Momentarily, I will go into a more thorough discussion regarding the inconsequentiality and, well, utter stupidity of this story concept which isn’t even consistently unique, but there is still something refreshing about this idea behind bringing Frankenstein’s monster to the modern world as an action star, and that establishes enough intrigue, without the idea’s being kind of cool in its mixture of horror, fantasy, sci-fi and action into one, crazy vision to begin with. The execution of a potentially fun story concept is an overwrought misfire, but not exactly an out-and-out disaster, as there are enough glimpses of a fun flick through stylistic highlights to keep the final product from meeting death on its feet (By that, I don’t actually mean Frankenstein’s monster). With that said, this film is still flat to the point of bordering on disaster, under the weight of anything from abrasions to laziness, particularly when it comes to harvesting the potential uniqueness of this film.

Shamelessly derivative of “Underworld” and “Blade”, and most everything else in either vein, Stuart Beattie’s scrip “starts” its problems by not simply doing more-or-less nothing unique with its handling of a unique idea, but being grossly trite in its dialogue, set pieces, characterization, and so on so forth, making it all the harder for the story to compensate for its conceptual flaws through refreshing touches. I’ve gone on and on about how kind of unique, interesting and fun this film’s story concept is, but as if it’s not enough that it’s totally inconsequential, when I say that it mixes horror, fantasy, sci-fi and action, I mean that is, plain and simple, about Frankenstein’s monster joining forces with gargoyles and a human scientist love interest to prevent a demon prince disguised as a businessman from using the technology behind Ungeheuer (German for “Monster”; as this film brings up, why can’t “Adam Frankenstein” have a name?) to raise a demon army to take over the world, and all that jazz, and that kind of ludicrous, slam-banged narrative ironically could feel like too crazy of a ride if its interpretation was to, say, take itself too blasted seriously. Well, sure enough, considering that Beattie’s storytelling can’t even keep controlled enough to milk its story’s potential uniqueness, it’s noisily abrasive with its tension and painfully contrived in its dramatic and thematic visuals and scene staging, which reflect a lack of subtlety which defuses engagement value, with the help of some genuine lapses in competence. Even the technical value of the film is terribly flimsy, because with all my compliments of the visual style and effects highlights, when style slips, it falls flat, and when technical value hits hiccups, oh man, it’s embarrassing, especially for a major film of 2014, but, unfortunately, the incompetence does not end there, because even when it comes to the acting, save Billy Nighy’s relative effectiveness and leading man Aaron Eckhart’s being fair in his essentially stereotypical reprisal of the Harvey Two-Face, or rather, Harvey Multi-Face (You know, because his face was built with several faces), just about everyone ranges from mediocre to just plain awful. Beattie’s direction of style and the performers is absolutely messy and all over the place, and just that can be said about Beattie’s telling of this story, which is at its most disjointed during a seriously slam-banged development segment, yet is consistently inconsistent, with plot holes, crowbarred motivations and all around incoherency that gets the narrative bumping right along, and not even with even momentum. Like I said, Beattie has enough of a grip on pacing to make sure that it never falls into overt limpness, but he still can’t ever seem to figure out what he’s doing, making sure that the film is either too frantic, or too slow, not to the point of tedium, but certainly to the point of considerable blandness. The film can’t even entertain like it ought to, and that really makes it hard to forgive all of the almost startling incompetence here, because even though there is enough flare to this fluff piece to prevent the final product from falling as just plain bad, it’s nothing more than a few highlights amidst consistent sloppiness.

Bottom line, there are some appealing highlights in visual style and technical value, strong action, and enough liveliness to direction for you to soak up the story’s own color, and for the final product to barely transcend contemptibility, but not overshadow the trite and contrived telling of a thin and ludicrous narrative, or the incompetent lowlights in technicality, acting, and coherency to structure and pacing which secure “I, Frankenstein” as, at best, a major mediocre misfire of a lame neo-gothic “thriller”.

2/5 – Weak