Lisa Frankenstein Review

Lisa Frankenstein is a horror-comedy that aims to homage to films from the ‘80s as it shows the friendship between a teenage girl and the living dead.

Lisa Swallow (Kathryn Newton) is a morbid high school senior suffering from depression after her mother was violently murdered. Her situation is made worse by living with her absentee father, Dale (Joe Chrest), and narcissistic stepmum, Janet (Carla Gugino). After attending a party where Lisa’s drink was spiked and strange green lightning struck an abandoned graveyard, a Victorian man (Cole Sprouse) gets resurrected. Lisa and The Creature form a friendship and Lisa slowly gains more confidence.

Lisa Frankenstein was a film where the distributor seemed like it had little faith in it. In America, it was released on Superbowl weekend which is usually a dumping ground for films and usually a home for counter-programming. While in the UK it was released on the same weekend as Dune: Part Two and was unable to book many screens because of the colossal hit. The only screening available to me was late at night and there was hardly anyone else viewing with me. Even though Lisa Frankenstein cost $13 million, it has underperformed at the box office.

Lisa Frankenstein’s promotion focused on its writer, Diablo Cody. She’s best known for winning an Academy Award with her debut film, Juno. The promotion pointed out she wrote Jennifer’s Body and Cody even said Lisa Frankenstein takes place within the same universe as Jennifer’s Body. Lisa Frankenstein will probably have a similar fate as Jennifer’s Body since they both were met with a lukewarm reception, but Jennifer’s Body has garnered a cult fanbase.

Lisa Frankenstein was a film that had a certain charm. It served as Zelda Willaims’ feature-length directional debut having previously directed two short films and working as an actress. Williams showed she had potential as a filmmaker. With Lisa Frankenstein she made it look like Heathers if directed by Tim Burton. Lisa Frankenstein shares a look with Tim Burton’s early films, especially Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands. All three films were set in a picturesque, American setting, that had some sort of supernatural element and focused on an unusual friendship. All these films feature death in some form. The animated opening credit sequences would have fitted in a Burton film.

Heathers was a dark teen comedy that focused on a popular girl who turns against her clique by murdering them. Lisa Frankenstein also focused on teen characters, in a high school setting, and showed characters who were willing to use lethal measures to eliminate their enemies. Lisa had an arc where she went from feeling depressed and listless to having a lush for life, and all it took was a resurrected man and murdering people. Newton’s performance felt similar to the one she gave in Freaky where she went from a shy and awkward outsider to a confident murderer.

Lisa Frankenstein was not shy about its influences. The title was an obvious reference to the Mary Shelley story where a man was created through other people’s body parts. Lisa got body parts for The Creature and reanimated them through electricity. When The Creature got a new body part, he became a little more human, a bit like R in Warm Bodies. Lisa said “Damn it Janet” which was a reference to The Rocky Horror Picture Show which involved a mad scientist resurrecting the dead. Lisa was watching the zombie classic Day of the Dead where a main subplot involved a zombie showing he retained some human intelligence.

Where Lisa Frankenstein faltered was the story and style of humour. Both can be described as scattershot. The story had multiple threads. A part of the story was an attempt to make a teenage rom-com where Lisa has two potential love interests, her crush, Michael (Henry Eikenberry), and The Creature, a coming-of-age style where Lisa’s friendship with The Creature helps her gain confidence, and there was dark comedy involving the increasing body count. The filmmakers didn’t know which story they wanted to focus on and these three ideas didn’t gel together. This unfocused approach also affected the comedy since it fell into two camps. The first was Cody’s writing, her quick, witty dialogue, the second type of comedy was being deliberately over-the-top and campy, as a homage to its B-Movie influences. These two types of comedy did feel disjointed.

Lisa Frankenstein marked Liza Soberano’s American film debut. She had previously worked in The Philippines. She was impressive as a seemingly shallow popular girl who could have been a stereotypical mean girl, but she was welcoming of her step-sister. Taffy was kind to Lisa and tried to help her out of her depression, even her actions were misguided. It was cool to see Taffy being a bit more layered than the expected stereotype and hopefully Soberano will earn more roles in Hollywood.

Lisa Frankenstein was a throwback to a bygone era and it worked as a nostalgic fused entertainment. Williams shows she has a good visual eye. It’s a shame the film was unfocused.