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At first blush, the plot description of Lisa Frankenstein might make one think: didn’t Warm Bodies come out already? Despite originating from the pen of acclaimed screenwriter Diablo Cody, Lisa Frankenstein is hardly the most original film. In fact, it is very deliberately an homage to a variety of Cody’s influences. Set in 1989, the film aims to take the 80s teen comedy and splash it with a dash of 50s horror and even early Hollywood strangeness. The result is a film that is unfortunately fairly mediocre, though one can praise Cody and director Zelda Williams for at least making it a colorful and eccentric work.
The film does a fairly good job of capturing the 80s aesthetic, from the costuming to the music and tonality. Like some of the rougher 80s teen movies, the tone can be a bit haphazard in this one, pivoting between broad physical comedy, a teenage girl dealing with the death of her mother, making light of death of all kinds, and sex jokes, all with the shambling grace of Cole Sprouse‘s lurching undead protagonist. If the intent was to recreate the tonal whiplash from those films of old, then good job, though this may not be a particularly wise pursuit.
Kathryn Newton is decent as the main character Lisa, though the attempts to undercut the more serious moments with humor hampers her from really showing off her acting chops. Her character also feels more like a riff on Winona Ryder from Heathers than something really unique. Sprouse’s role renders him mute apart from grunts for most of the film. While he’s not so talented an actor that he can effectively act with his face in the way a Tom Hardy or Leonardo DiCaprio can, he’s at least decent enough at the comedic beats.
The film’s larger issue is the rather dull way it renders its romantic story. The plot is also a spin on Heathers; Newton accidentally wishes a romantic young man back to life, who starts murdering people, while she gets closer to her own romantic objective, the editor of the high school literary mag. The pair then start to fall in love, sort of.
Despite how predictable it is, the film never effectively conveys this romance or makes you care for it. Part of the issue is how little we ever learn about Sprouse’s undead character. While his muteness was a decent enough choice to pay homage to Frankenstein (there are a number of visual references to that film and to Bride of Frankenstein), the script never figures out a way to effectively build his character or make us root for lead pair getting together. The film also factors in Newton dealing with the grief of losing her mom and having moved in with a new family as her father quickly remarried, but this plot thread is never satisfying developed either.
Ironically, the most interesting character in the film is Lisa’s step-sister, played by Liza Soberano. While she is casted as the prototypical cheerleader girl, her character is given the most depth of anyone in the film, actually showing lots of kindness even when her own mother and friends ostracize Lisa. And while she has characteristics of a more shallow teenage girl type, the way she navigates her own catty comments and genuinely cares for others make her feel like the most realistic person on screen. Hats off to Soberano’s performance here.
Lisa Frankenstein‘s wonky scripting and plot render it something far less than it could be. While the film has many treats for fans of cinema, with visual references to A Trip to the Moon, Creature from the Black Lagoon, and even a discussion where Lisa mentions G.W. Pabst as her favorite director, the failure to develop it past the reference-laden work that it is ultimately disappoints. It’s not a bad film, and it even manages to entertain in parts. But its predictability and thinly-drawn characters and plot beats make it a duller affair than anything this colorful should be.
