What if Victor Frankenstein’s monster was not only alive today, but also immersed in a shadowy war between a gargoyle race charged with protecting humanity and a power-hungry prince of darkness with legions of demon minions? This is the question that actor-turned-writer and graphic novelist Kevin Grevioux attempts to answer in I, Frankenstein. Clues to the outcome lay with Grevioux, and cues to the execution too. The co-scribe’s resume extends to the Underworld film series, a property I, Frankenstein clearly tries to emulate.
The creature created centuries ago still lurks on the outskirts of society, neither man nor beast, but named Adam by gargoyle queen Leonore (Miranda Otto, Tim Winton’s The Turning). At first, Adam (Aaron Eckhart, Olympus Has Fallen) refuses to join the battle against the treacherous Naberius (Bill Nighy, About Time), but the demon hordes keep coming – not to kill, but to capture – so that unwitting scientist Terra (Yvonne Strahovski, TV’s Dexter) can study the secrets of his reanimated subsistence. Sick of running from his pursuers and hiding from his own nature, soon he has no other choice but to fight.
Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus is a masterpiece of Gothic horror, more for the pertinent and pronounced existential ruminations on what it means to be human, than for the aesthetics of the perceived monster in its midst. Not so the latest cinematic interpretation of the now-famous figure, which steeps its depiction in all the possible trappings of the genre. Frankenstein’s creature remains consumed by inner turmoil, but the conflict raging around him dwarfs his own struggle. His quest of understanding – what he is, why he exists, what his purpose is – is superficial in this continuation of the story. Of primary importance, ignoring the many holes in the plot, is pitting Adam against a frightening, world-threatening adversary.
Writer/director Stuart Beattie (Tomorrow, When the War Began) extends his preference for derivation to the film’s obvious visual choices, as constructed around Eckhart’s barely modified, hardly representative form. Computer generated imagery runs rampant, as gargoyles fly and demons swarm in battle after battle at the crux of the sinister picture. Beattie’s version of the tortured protagonist sidles through deserted laneways and sits amid over-emphasised period architecture, is constantly surrounded by foes of the crudely creepy variety, and remains in the long and lingering shadow of perpetual nightfall.
I, Frankenstein offers little reprieve from the monotonous assault of fantasy clichés and images of grey in its other elements, nor does it seem concerned with its veering tone, careening between serious action and unintended comedy to the benefit of neither. Dialogue is blatant and clumsy, including the in-conversation justification of the feature’s title in reference to the monster. The performances can’t and don’t fare any better within such bounds, reducing all involved to adapting their familiar types to the circumstances, and evoking the requisite moodiness with the straightest of faces.
The film may resolve its central narrative quandary as Frankenstein’s creature copes with his chaotic scenario, but in doing so another question arises: can the feature’s twist on the classic character sustain interest? Not in this overwrought, over-simplified, overly acted, good-versus-evil form, nor in the movie’s evident striving for its own franchise. That a crossover with Underworld was once mooted is far from surprising, and again, goes some way towards explaining the end result.
Rating: 1½ stars out of 5
I, Frankenstein
Director: Stuart Beattie
US / Australia, 2014, 92 mins
Release date: March 20
Distributor: Hopscotch
Rated: M
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