Frankenstein was the doctor, not the monster. That much will be a revelation to some folks, and maybe for them this ill-conceived origin story, Victor Frankenstein, will satisfy.
Not so for anyone bred on classic horror, those who read Mary Shelley鈥檚 classic novel in school or just about anyone looking for a credible story with some sort of an emotional core.
There鈥檚 certainly a lot of story going on in Max Landis鈥� adaptation, to the screenplay鈥檚 detriment. (Landis should know the genre, being the son of John Landis, director of Twilight Zone: the Movie and American Werewolf In London.)
When we first meet the as-yet-unnamed Igor (Daniel Radcliffe), he is a performing circus clown with a terrible hunch. Of course, we couldn鈥檛 let Radcliffe run around with a hunched back AND that horrible hair, so Victor Frankenstein (James McAvoy), who happens to be trolling the circus for spare body parts, fixes the clown鈥檚 deformity and saves a lovely acrobat (Jessica Brown Findlay, Downton Abbey) in the process, thereby securing Igor鈥檚 fidelity.
Reluctant fidelity, that is, as Radcliffe spends a great deal of his screen time playing the moral compass against Victor鈥檚 vision of cooking up a human being from his own special recipe. Also fretting over the morality of their endeavours is a Scotland Yard detective (Andrew Scott), who lectures the boys on the consequences of playing God while chasing them around a grey and dreary London in order to inject a false sense of energy and dramatic urgency into the plot.
鈥淐hased by monsters and hunted by the police!鈥� complains Igor. 鈥淲ell, if you鈥檙e going to concentrate on the dark side鈥︹�� whines Victor in response.
Ah yes, Victor. Speaking of that bloated story, we are also treated to a kind of psychoanalysis of Victor鈥檚 childhood trauma; we meet his disapproving dad (Charles Dance) and unearth his motivation to disprove God鈥檚 existence by creating life out of dead debris.
McAvoy is a fine actor, but his Victor is a spoiled, egocentric mess. He and Radcliffe take turns vying for 鈥楤est Overacting in a Dramatic Role,鈥� particularly during the 鈥淚t鈥檚 alive鈥� moments when creature(s) jerk and writhe and the boys yell and duck-and-weave in and out of machinery.
There is plenty of superfluous goo in director Paul McGuigan鈥檚 film 鈥� and one or two sudden scares. When the computer-generated 鈥渕onster鈥� does appear, he鈥檚 none too happy to be there. None of the poignancy that made Shelley鈥檚 monster, Boris Karloff or even Robert De Niro a sympathetic character.
And so this is no one鈥檚 film: not the monster鈥檚, nor a cocky and unlikable Victor, and especially not Igor, who starts off being the potential narrator of the film and ends up being an ineffectual bystander. With no one at the heart of the story it鈥檚 difficult to stay interested for long.
鈥淚t was on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils.鈥� The timing is fitting, I suppose, for a new origin story of Shelley鈥檚 classic novel to come to the big-screen: but there all logic ends.
Victor Frankenstein plays at International Village.
