I Just Saw

I just watched Lisa Frankenstein and it was one of those movies where almost nothing really works, and yet… I kind of loved it.

The unfortunately named Lisa Swallows (Kathryn Newton) is an ‘80s teenage outcast whose mother was killed by an axe murderer. She’s now struggling to deal with a bitchy stepmother (Carla Gugino) and aggressively nice stepsister (Liza Soberano). After being spiked and then almost raped at a party, she runs into a haunted graveyard to caress a favourite tomb, belonging to a Victorian man (Cole Sprouse) who digs his way out when lightning strikes. Hiding him in her closet, problems arise and bodies pile up.

If all of that sounded like barely coherent ad-libs, it basically is. Directed – in her feature-length debut – by Zelda Williams (daughter of the late Robin), it’s written by Diablo Cody. Cody I’d argue is one of the better “name” screenwriters in Hollywood. She’s known for smart, self-aware comedies that satirise female archetypes, and it’s possible to view Lisa Frankenstein as the terminus of a trilogy featuring precocious teenage girls. Juno (2007) starred Elliot (then Ellen) Page as a horror film fan who gets pregnant, Jennifer’s Body (2009) was itself a horror comedy about a zombie cheerleader, and Cody’s confirmed that Lisa Frankenstein takes place in the same universe as that film.

Lisa Frankenstein, however, is the strangest and most disconnected work in her entire oeuvre. It’s a real oddity, lurching from one set piece to another with little grace or fluidity, and with characters who feel like straight-up space cadets. The script plays like it needed at least another draft before it made sense. Plot points seem as though they’re placeholders for rewriting later, while characters are more setups for crude jokes approaching surreal anti humour.

The film is meant as a tribute to ‘80s teen movies, in particular Weird Science (1985), the one about teenage boys who make their own ideal woman. Yet it feels closer to the madcap X-rated satires of the ‘70s. The drag queen Divine could have played Lisa Swallows and made the same jokes about vibrators and necrophilia.

I enjoyed its carefully curated visual world, with bubblegum colours and big hair, and honestly? I liked the sheer gonzo daffiness of it all. I laughed, and even when baffled was enjoying myself at least somewhat. I admit I was baffled a lot. In one scene the stepmother accuses Lisa of putting a worm in her food, when there’s no feasible way that she could have done that, and that’s the least unbelievable point. Later we’re expected to believe that sexual organs can be reused after being crudely sewn back on. (Don’t ask).

Lisa Frankenstein doesn’t work as romance, it doesn’t work as drama, it probably gets more bad laughs than good (bad laughs being where you laugh in incredulity), but if a part of you vibrates with its brand of disconnected weirdness and dark comedy, it may become your new guilty pleasure. It feels destined to become a cult classic.

Rating: 2.5/4