Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
Irish gods and American monsters.

Scarred by the death of his mother in childbirth, Victor Frankenstein (Kenneth Branagh) leaves his home to study medicine at a far off university. His grief and arrogance melds with his fascination for ancient texts containing accounts of what can only be described as experiments in magic, rather than science leading to his apprenticeship under a professor with similar bents. The only problem is that Victor does not heed his master's warnings and pushes on with his experiments at the cost of not only everyone he's ever loved, but his own soul as well.

The morale of Mary Shelley's classic tale of a doctor who plays god and the creature (Robert De Niro) he creates seems especially relevant in today's era of cloning and various other medical breakthroughs. Victor Frankenstein crosses into the realm of evil when he follows his conceit. Although early on he professes that his desire is to save the lives of those he loves, his single-minded attitude is what eventually leads to their total annihilation.

The Lord of the Sweaty-Chested Dance

The film has the makings of a classic. Wiping the slate clean, it ignores all of its hokey predecessors and tries to be more true to the original intent of the novel. And while there are some striking visuals, it is a little too antiseptic for its own good. The lab itself is quite impressive with it's myriad cables and chains and tortuous looking devices -- not to mention having a sweaty, disheveled, impressively maned, and shirtless Irishman named Kenneth Branagh stomping around clad only in tight, black pants and a long, open, flowing dressing gown -- occupying a cavernous space but that's about the extent of the mood right there. Well, unless you count the arctic scenes, which I suppose are fairly decent. The Frankenstein home in Salzburg however is quite bland. Even the grand staircase has the look of not being completely finished and the subsequent scenes involving the long, trailing red cloak just seem to fall flat.

Then again, I could just be spoiled by painfully gorgeous to look at movies like Sleepy Hollow.

Perhaps it was the romance however, that truly neutered the film. Bonham Carter is quite frankly the dramatic equivalent of Wonderbread. While we aren't talking complete Winona Ryder in Dracula-dom here, it's pretty close. Of course her character was important, but her presence just didn't hold up to that idea of a woman of any kind of substance. I suppose I should be happy they didn't cast Gwyneth Paltrow, huh? Much more satisfying where the scenes between Tom Hulce and Ken Branagh and of course the few moments of screen time we were given with Branagh and De Niro together.

DROOL FACTOR: My sister has this big thing for Robert De Niro, but I doubt that even she could deal with his monstrous looks in this movie. Kenneth Branagh on the other hand proves that even previously pasty Shakespearean actors can look ultra hot with long, luxurious curls and a well sculpted chest. I may even have to rethink my anti-chest hair stance. Oh, and despite the very small amount of screen time he gets, Aidan Quinn with long hair looks so good that I may have to rethink my anti-Aidan Quinn stance as well.

GROSS-OUT FACTOR: De Niro, as I mentioned before, is quite... um... icky, but the real honors goes to the re-animated Helena Bonham Carter. It's bad enough they had to kill her so graphically, but did they also have to set her hair on fire and keep showing us the results? Ewwww!

STRONG CHICK FACTOR: Ummm... Ummm... Nope. Sorry.

-- Linda M. Najera

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is currently available on video.

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