Film Review: Victor Frankenstein

Victor Frankenstein: No Spoils, But Definitely Spoiled

Studios these days seem determined to make big budget adaptations of period characters: anything from swords 'n sandals, via the Bible, to Victorian literary characters is getting the blockbuster treatment. So determined are they for a sure thing that huge coin is thrown at better-known properties. They also know that the public loves franchises and familiarity right now so one hit can all but guarantee the next. Outside of the realm of Marvel/DC the studios are casting their nets for origin stories from which to spawn a hit machine. Call me cynical if you like, but they started it.

I blame Sherlock. Not so much the Guy Ritchie-Robert Downey Jr. films (although they do fit my argument a bit better), but the successful BBC adaptations. Along with the Lord Of The Rings-Harry Potter-Chronicles of Narnia films, it's international success has made studios thirsty for another franchisable literary character to throw money at. Take the literary gravitas attached to the LOTR series, the period aesthetic given to the Harry Potter films, and the current studio penchant for reboots and re-hashes; all of this makes contemporary versions of well known characters catnip to executives looking to inflate the bottom line. Which brings me to Victor Frankenstein (Paul McGuigan, 2015) which uses all of the above to demonstrate how to cynically drain the blood from a potentially brilliant property.

Failing to learn lessons from unsuccessful recent adaptations of the classic Universal monsters, such as Dracula Untold (Gary Shore, 2014), I, Frankenstein (Stuart Beattie, 2014) and The Wolfman (Joe Johnston, 2010), another studio attempt to breathe life into the undead sees existing franchise superstars James McAvoy and Daniel Radcliffe leap gaping plot holes in a single bound and dodge huge reanimated monsters such as CGI zombies and narrative logic. Although, truth be told, Victor Frankenstein is not all bad. And that's the frustrating thing here: at least the aforementioned films were nailed on turkeys, guaranteed to be awful from the moment Voice Over Man dutifully introduced the appalling trailer, but this at least had the balls to try something new, and then utterly cop out half way through by reverting to type.

A Victorian-set blockbuster can go one of two ways: You can go for the knotty plot and character dynamics of The Prestige (Christopher Nolan, 2006), or the fun-but-slight Sherlock Holmes films; or you can go for the full CGI, logic-be-damned, studio-molested messes that brought us Van Helsing (Stephen Sommers, 2004) or The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen (Stephen Norrington, 2003). Victor Frankenstein at least attempts the former in terms of a character-driven story based around a central relationship, rather than just build up to an implausible CGI throwdown (although it does eventually do just that). The master-apprentice dynamic of McAvoy's Frankenstein and Radcliffe's Igor serves the film well at first, using the Sherlock dynamic: one of them is the audience's proxy, good but not brilliant; the other is stupendously intelligent, a visionary, but also a bit sociopathic. Like our proxy, we are swept along on his ride. It's no coincidence that director Paul McGuigan helmed four episodes of the BBC series.

There is a lot about Victor Frankenstein which reeks of a studio betting on a sure thing. As well as the Sherlock-isms, there is the casting. McAvoy is one of the stars of the X-Men franchise and Radcliffe's eternal fame was cemented the first time he shouted “Expelliarmus”. Radcliffe tries manfully to shake his acting origins (Talking to a girl! Having a physical deformity!) but is still lumbered with the role of wide-eyed apprentice. I half expected him to summon his patronus when things got dicey towards the end. Then there's some of most obvious stunt casting I've ever seen: Sherlock's Andrew Scott plays almost the exact mirror opposite of his Moriarty persona and doesn't suit the role one bit; more laughable was a brief cameo from Charles Dance, playing Frankenstein's dictatorial father, er, Frankenstein, who is uncannily similar to Tywin Lannister from Game Of Thrones.

However, the biggest sinner on show is McAvoy. He's a talented actor but there are times here when he's so over the top that he makes Nicholas Cage look like Ryan Gosling. Remember the scene in Heat where Al Pacino is questioning a suspect and unexpectedly screams “Yeah, but she's got a GREAT ASS!” to throw him off guard? It marked the start of Pacino's Late Overacting Phase. If this marks the start of McAvoy's, I fully expect him to scream “I'M READING YOUR MIND BECAUSE I'M A MUTANT!” every time he does that fingers-to-his-temple thing in the next X-Men film. At times, he is inexcusably bad in this film.

Narrative-wise, you've seen this all before. That may seem like an obvious thing to say about a reboot of a classic character taken from a classic novel, but from the 2^nd act onwards it really is painfully obvious. The only interesting thing it does is to tell the story from Igor's point of view, like Dr. Watson or R2D2. Correcting Igor's posture so that the shoehorned love interest seems more plausible does not quality as surprising because it's such a cop out. The plot goes as follows: Igor is rescued from a life of misery as a circus performer, he becomes inexplicably good a medical stuff very quickly, the police disapprove of their methods, the first experiment fails, a rich investor steps in with his own nefarious plan, the protagonists are split up, much to nobody's surprise they end up making a monster, the protagonists are reunited, stuff catches fire for some reason and they have to kill said monster. I've saved you 110 minutes of your life with that synopsis (you're welcome, send chocolate to show your gratitude).

It's such a shame, because with the talented cast, a decent director and some initial good ideas, they could have breathed new life into a much loved corpse. Instead, it looks very much to me like an exercise in studio box-ticking, one so shallow that the final coda, suggesting further adventures to come, seems pitifully optimistic. Much like reanimating the dead.