When it comes to genres teeming with clichéd horror elements, Lisa Frankenstein stands out as strikingly peculiar. Bold, strange, and eccentric, Lisa Frankenstein is all that and more combined. While Zelda Williams makes her directorial debut with this film, Diablo Cody, known for Juno and Jennifer’s Body, penned the screenplay. The film is a gothic horror teen romance dark comedy blend. It can be considered a mall-rat version of Frankenstein, drenched in high school depression as well as 1980s nostalgia and eyeliner.
The film does not shy away from its odd premise and, instead, embraces it wholeheartedly. The movie embraces its unique setup with open, reanimated limbs. While it was released in early 2024, the premise remains bizarre throughout. At its core lies a tale of identity, loss, and learning to love even the strangest parts of yourself. Alongside this soothing rhythm of campy horror, violence, and a synth-laden soundtrack it certainly does deliver.
Plot Overview
In the movie set in 1989, emotionally withdrawn Lisa Swallows, played by Kathryn Newton, faces the daunting reality of high school life after the tragic murder of her mother. Their death isolates them, and for Lisa, older classic horror movies serve as a reprieve alongside her sewing projects and frequent visits to a certain cemetery where she can collect her thoughts—and mingle with a certain grave that piques her interest.
The grave catches Lisa’s attention as it belonged to a long-dead, nameless man from the 1800s. The classic horror enthusiast finds him oddly captivating. Following an odd electrical storm, the corpse gets resurrected which leaves Lisa face to face with a decaying yet curiously alluring man (played by Cole Sprouse). His lack of speech is compensated by his strange ability to understand her.
Just as Lisa demonstrates fascination, it is clear the two are in an abusive relationship, but this transforms into a bizarre emotional connection that is reciprocated. The ‘relationship’ (as one cavity refers to another in this stitched together entity) evolves into setting out on the journey to make him “whole” body part by body part. While identifying as a duo, they embark on a self-discovery transformative journey filled with revenge, surrounded by darkness.
Their bond deepens while a string of puzzling deaths and dismemberments starts to unfold in the town. As Lisa navigates her relationship with the Creature, she embraces her newfound voice and confidence, but also begins losing herself to the intoxicating helplessness of chaotic power and rebellion.
Characters and Performances
Kathryn Newton brings depth and nuance to her portrayal of Lisa delivering a sharp performance. Her character embodies vulnerability, but in a strong, compelling way, and also embraces quirk that deftly skirts the edge of caricature. Newton’s transformation throughout the film — from grieving misfit to assertive anti-heroine — is gradual yet definitive.
Cole Sprouse, utterly silent for most of the film as the Creature, uses body movements to project emotions. He infuses so much horror and heart into his portrayal through a hunched posture, searching eyes, and subtle gestures, ensuring this character does not become a ridiculous stereotype.
Liza Soberano steps into her first major American film role as Taffy, Lisa’s bright, popular stepsister. Taffy’s superficial persona relies on the classic high school mean girl trope, however, Soberano depicts her with unexpected complexity. She serves not only as a comical counterbalance, but also as an emotional anchor, especially when the storyline turns more sinister.
Carla Gugino as Lisa’s cold and perfectionist stepmother Janet adds another layer of tension in the household as she sharpens the edge of the family dynamics. She serves as an antagonist, not in a villainous manner, but rather, soberingly authentic to emotional exploitation and societal expectations.
Analysis Themes
And Symbolism
- Grief and Rebirth
Lisa’s story is profoundly rooted in trauma. The emotionally turbulent gap left by her mother’s death is paired with her familial bond to the reanimated Creature. In many aspects, her relationship with the Creature serves as a replacement to something that was shattered and desperately needed mending. The Creature is, by all means, grief personified. Decayed, stitched-together, and still longing for purpose and love.
- Female Empowerment and Rebellion
The film tackles head-on the reclaiming of narrative in the context of a teenage girl’s life, who has often been underestimated and misunderstood. Lisa’s bond with the Creature carved some autonomy for her, but the film challenges the notion, asking whether that autonomy is overreaching when pursued obsessively.
- Dynamics of Identity Formation
At its heart, Lisa Frankenstein is a tale of metamorphosis, which includes a girl undergoing self-discovery, emerging from her figurative chrysalis. The militant reassembly of the Creature is the parallel of where self-discovery slices the epidermis of self-identity. As she begins helping in the reassembly of the Creature, she is also reconstructing herself, fetchingly, step by step.
- Parody and Discourse
Smith’s diabolic wit is underspoken. Nothing in the universe captures her brilliant craftsmanship like the way Lisa contemplates and adapts all cliches diabolic as of twenty first century beauty, grade and demeanor marking school meesterbation movies. Strikingly, Lisa contemplates breaking class’s fetters while craftily attempting to culminate socialize as an architect planned garden of distraction. Iconoclast tendencies carved in the psyche of destruction emanate from social framing fabricate unfathomably confounding.
Visual and Aesthetic Style
The portrayal given to the film by the Director of the film Zelda Williams is chillingly marvelous. She astoundingly puts forth every constituent of costume and prop mark epitome of the eighties like pastel twang kitchens and sleeves which were puffy more VHS and horror parde poster”}}. Through this attention to detail, she lights set pieces in soft greens and purples during the surreal moments, which is a hallmark of stylized lighting.
The Creature’s design is grotesque yet captivating without ever going into caricature. He is physically present on-screen, with practical effects done over CGI lending a weight to his presence. The graphic scenes of body part collection are often accompanied by a dark, humorous undertone, balancing between terrifying and ludicrous.
Tone and Pacing
There is balance between horror and comedy in the film’s approach. It does not aim for the typical slasher-style jump scares or outright terror. Instead it offers off-kilter, moody experiences laced with dry humor, emotional beats, and gory bursts. With its slow pacing, relationships are built as the strangeness begins to increase.
Conclusion
Lisa Frankenstein is stunning in its bold, bizarre approach as a blend of genres. It is a love letter to horror classics, while critiquing conformity with an emotional coming-of-age tale, all stitched together with heart, humor, and blood.
This is a must for lovers of off-beat horror films like Heathers, Beetlejuice, or Jennifer’s Body. It dabbles in being violently messy, both emotionally and physically, making it feel original and void of sentimentality.
Ultimately, Lisa Frankenstein represents two fractured spirits searching for one another in a realm that is utterly confused about how to handle the existence of either. Perhaps, that is the most haunting and beautiful idea.
Watch free movies on Fmovies