Schlock Corridor: Day Twelve

SCHLOCK CORRIDOR: The Frankenstein Theory

What can one say about Frankenstein? That one word is known the world over, an iconic name that seems burned into our collective consciousness. Beginning with Mary Shelley's original novel, published in 1818, adapted to numerous stage productions in the 19th and early 20th centuries, making the leap to film with an early production from The Edison Studios in 1910, to Boris Karloff's legendary interpretation of the man-made monster in a trilogy of classic horror pictures made by Universal Studios in the 1930's, to Hammer Films' lurid sextet of chillers starring genre icon Peter Cushing as the man who made a monster (and another monster, and another...) and so on, this brilliant story can be interpreted in so many ways and yet the seed of Shelley's original narrative can still be recognized within the structure of the beast in whatever form it takes.

I first read the novel when I was 10 years old, having already familiarized myself with the classic Universal Studios efforts, and was shocked to learn that the "monster" in the novel was no grunting, mindless creature, but rather an eloquent and surprisingly sensitive soul who managed to elicit as much sympathy for me as the childlike, impulsive creature embodied by Boris Karloff in the films. I hated the novel's Victor Frankenstein for immediately rejecting his creation moments after he gave it life, shunning this newborn creature and thrusting it into a superstitious and cruel world that could never simply accept the wretch due to its shocking size and appearance.

Victor became obsessed with his quest to re-animate the dead, to conquer death itself, and yet as soon as he accomplished his goal he turned away from its results, repulsed by what he had made. Perhaps it's my philosophy of "science over superstition", or maybe it's because I've always had a fondness for so-called mad scientists, or it may just be the simple fact that I am an advocate for conquering nature and spitting in the face of God, but I just can't get behind Victor Frankenstein's almost immediate rejection of everything he believes when he is confronted with proof of his mastery over such titanic forces as life and death. What a pussy.

But I suppose a version of the story in which Frankenstein immediately embraces his creation, teaching his surrogate son everything he knows, and integrating him into a society that will be forever changed by his discovery may not be the most exciting sequence of events for most folks. It doesn't matter, really, because I still love the novel, especially the version so beautifully illustrated by comic book legend Bernie Wrightson. It's an amazing work of fiction, one that I have come to cherish in numerous incarnations.

But what if it isn't a work of fiction? What if Mary Shelley based her classic literary work on an all-too-real monster? That's the concept behind The Frankenstein Theory, a found-footage movie from two of the producers behind The Last Exorcism that was released earlier this year. I'd never heard of it before Netflix recommended it to me, so I decided to give it a shot.

The Frankenstein Theory is presented as the footage left behind by a documentary crew hired by one Professor John Venkenheim (Kris Lemche, who was quite good in 2000's Ginger Snaps), a wunderkind who has come to believe that his ancestor was the historical basis for the character of Victor Frankenstein, and that his creation still lives in the wilds of Canada, feeding on caribou and murdering anyone who blunders into his path in order to protect his secret existence. It seems old Johann Venkenheim was a member of the Illuminati, and the actual founder of genetic science as we know it (fuck you, Gregor Mendel!), building on centuries of research conducted by his secret society brethren to conquer death with the creation of his unkillable monster.

But Professor John can't prove this theory without finding the monster itself, and so he hires a semi-professional crew to film his adventure to the Great White North in order to track down this elusive beast that may or may not even exist. Since it's a found-footage movie, we can assume this adventure does not end well for all involved, otherwise it wouldn't really be "found footage".

After a brief detour spent interviewing a sweaty, unhinged tweeker (played by Joe Egender, a guy who can portray unhinged quite well based on his work in The Violent Kind) who claims to have encountered the monster, our intrepid crew meets up with their wilderness guide Karl (Timothy V. Murphy, also known as "that Irish prick" from Sons Of Anarchy) and they set out for a secluded little spot just north of the Arctic Circle, located precisely in the middle of fucking nowhere. They hang out in a yurt, drink booze, cruise around on snowmobiles, and discuss the finer points of being devoured by polar bears, while Professor John ruminates over his ancestor's work, trying to understand his now-lost method of creation and his rejection of what amounts to the culmination of his life's work.

John believes that if he's given the chance, he could reason with the creature, or "appeal to his humanity" as he's fond of saying. As it turns out, Johann Venkenheim's creation either lost its "humanity" over nearly 200 years alone in the Canadian wilderness, or it never had much of it in the first place, because it seems to relish stalking and tearing apart the entire documentary crew over the course of two tense days and nights in the freezing cold, leaving only John and his college girlfriend girl-who-is-a-friend Vicky alone in their rickety yurt. John sees this as the perfect opportunity to go outside and have a civilized conversation with the giant monster that just shredded all of his pals in a fit of savage rage, and doesn't get much further than the recitation of the name Venkenheim before his new friend transforms the foolish man into a series of meaty chunks distributed across the frozen tundra. Poor Vicky, left alone in the yurt, is attacked and dragged off into the woods, slung over the monster's shoulder, unconscious but presumably still alive and doomed to a fate worse than death in the form of repeated, non-consensual sweaty monster sex in a cramped cave somewhere in northern Canada.

That's The Frankenstein Theory, and I actually enjoyed this movie a whole lot more than I thought I would. The cast of characters is very likeable, rarely saying or doing something insultingly stupid, which I found remarkably refreshing considering how often the characters in films of this ilk are always making the worst possible choices, the kind of boneheaded decisions that make a viewer shake their head in frustration. The documentary crew is made up of a trio of actors who are surprisingly relatable in their reactions to the increasingly strange occurrences that confront them, and they're also frequently funny, their antics never feeling forced or grating, rather coming across as natural banter between friends.

These characters aren't fools, they're a crew of semi-professional filmmakers who just end up finding themselves in a situation for which they were woefully unprepared, not believing Venkenheim's tall tales of monsters and the re-animated dead, and they can't really be faulted for that. They think their subject is a kook, but they're willing to follow him on his wild goose chase as long as they get paid, at least until, as the cool kids say, shit gets real.

Evidence provided by Venkenheim that he claims to be proof of the monster's existence in the form of mortality statistics in remote Canadian villages, indicating a regular migratory pattern, is seen by the documentary crew as proof of the possible existence of a disturbingly prolific serial killer, and their guide Karl interprets this as proof of a deadly bear. Members of the crew are understandably upset by this news and react in a realistic fashion, realizing that whether the stories of Venkenheim's monster are true or not, someone or something dangerous is out there in the woods, and they're in over their heads. But this realization comes too late as they discover their snowmobiles destroyed the next morning, stranding them in this inhospitable wilderness with an entity that does not appreciate their presence.

Karl, believing their culprit to be nothing more than a mortal man, underestimates his quarry as he sets off into the trees to seek retribution, and he pays with his life. This makes sense in context, because the man is a skilled hunter of various predators, including bears, and doesn't expect his prey to be an immortal monster with the mind of a clever hunter working with over a century of experience and  possessing terrifying strength. He was completely outmatched and never stood a chance against a predator that he considered a work of fiction. Of course none of these people are going to survive their encounter with this mythical monster. He has killed scores of people over many decades in order to protect his secret, and these people are hunting him with video cameras instead of firearms. They were doomed from the beginning, but they just didn't know it.

John Venkenheim was the only one who fervently believed the monster to be real, but he was certain that he could reason with his ancestor's creation, and he paid for this folly with his life. I have no problems with any of this. None of these events feel trite or credibility-straining; they all make sense in the context of the film, and none of the characters feel like fools for the decisions they make. There was no solution to their problem and no way to escape their fate. They're tragic characters, and I felt bad for them when they were picked off by the bloodthirsty monster, which is a rarity for me with films like this. In the end, The Frankenstein Theory isn't an amazing or groundbreaking experience, and it didn't re-invent the wheel in terms of the horror or found-footage genres, it's just a reasonably well-made and well-acted b-movie, and that's just fine by me.

TOMORROW: Zombie Night