Lisa Frankenstein

Unfortunately, this horror-comedy isn’t that horrific or that funny, and instead is just inoffensively mildly amusing.

Premise:  Social outcast Lisa Swallows (Kathryn Newton) unexpectedly finds love when a bolt of lightning strikes the grave of a Victorian-era pianist buried in her local cemetery, and resurrects him as a mute zombie.

Review:

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed a lot of Kathryn Newton’s previous work in the horror genre (Freaky and Abigail were both a tonne of fun), and the script for Lisa Frankenstein comes from Juno-writer Diablo Cody – so on paper, this film had a lot going for it.

Unfortunately, the actual movie feels more like a concept than a satisfying story, with a handful of interesting and mildly amusing scenes stitched together into an incomplete whole.  The idea of a relationship between a human and a mute zombie was, IMHO, better realised in the 2013 movie Warm Bodies starring Nicholas Hoult, and this film doesn’t ever earn the name Lisa Frankenstein because the main character is entirely uninvolved in the resurrection of the Creature (played by Cole Sprouse).

“…not a ‘bad’ film, but it is a fairly forgettable one…”

Generally, the cast are all very good, especially Carla Gugino who seems to be having fun hamming it up as Lisa’s cruel stepmother, and Liza Soberano as Lisa’s well-meaning but oblivious stepsister.  But something about the film just isn’t working – perhaps it’s the slightly campy, surreal tone, or the leaps in character development that just don’t feel truly earned, or the jarring switches between genres from horrors spoof, to high school comedy, to gothic romance and back again.

Ultimately, Lisa Frankenstein is not a ‘bad’ film, but it is a fairly forgettable one, which in some respects is perhaps worse?  The lack of focus, the disjointed storytelling, the underdeveloped characters, and the constantly shifting tone mean that the film never feels entirely sure what it wants to say, and as a result, it isn’t really saying anything.