Frankenstein: Less than the sum of its parts

Frankenstein (2025) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated R, for bloody violence, gore and grisly images

Available via: Movie theaters and Netflix

By Derrick Bang

If this film doesn’t win an Academy Award for Tamara Deverell’s stunning production design, there is no justice.

 

Although initially delighted that he has brought life to a creation (Jacob Elordi, center) 
stitched together from scores of corpses, Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac) just as
quickly worries that he may have made a colossal mistakes.

And if the Oscars included a category for atmospheric dread, director/scripter Guillermo del Toro also would have that one locked up. He has been unsettling viewers since 1997’s Mimic and particularly 2006’s Pan’s Labyrinth. And only del Toro could have jump-started the goofy 1950s Creature from the Black Lagoon franchise, and transformed it into 2017’s brilliantly disorienting The Shape of Water, winning Oscars for Best Picture and Director in the process.

All this said, I wish del Toro had matched his new film’s visual dazzle with a similarly exhilarating script. His take has about as much in common with Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s 1818 Gothic masterpiece, as director James Whale’s 1931 adaptation. 

 

Which is to say, del Toro has taken serious liberties with the original plot and character roster. A few high points remain faithful to Shelley’s novel — along with occasional references to Prometheus, as befit the subtitle of Shelley’s novel (“The Modern Prometheus”) — but for the most part del Toro merely borrows the concept of Frankenstein and his monster.

 

That would be fine, if the results were more consistently engaging. At times — and I can’t believe I’m saying this about a del Toro film — the narrative is protracted and boring. As often has been the case with other filmmakers, one must be cautious about embarking upon a pet project which — in del Toro’s own words — has been a “quest” ever since he saw Whale’s film for the first time, at age 7.

 

Del Toro has moved the timeline half a century forward, to allow the key players a greater understanding of advances in electricity. The saga therefore begins in 1857, with a prelude aboard the Royal Danish Navy ship Horisont, trapped in arctic ice while hoping to reach the North Pole. While attempting to free the ship, crew members spot a badly injured man, and bring him aboard.

 

He barely has time to introduce himself as Baron Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac), before the ship is attacked by a powerful, towering creature that demands Victor be surrendered to him. Ship’s Captain Andersen (Lars Mikkelsen) refuses, and six of his men are killed in the subsequent violent melee; the creature withstands all manner of gunshots and other damage.

 

The calmly resolute Andersen wins the moment only after using his blunderbuss to shatter the ice beneath the monster’s feet. It sinks into the icy waters.

 

“It’ll be back,” Frankenstein warns. “It can’t be killed.”

 

On Swift Horses: More of a slow trot

On Swift Horses (2025) • View trailer

Three stars (out of five). Rated R, for nudity, sexual content and occasional profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.27.25

Although director Daniel Minahan draws achingly persuasive performances from the five core characters in this bittersweet melodrama, it’s hard to be satisfied with a story that concludes as this one does.

 

Lee (Will Poulter, left), his bride-to-be Muriel (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and his brother
Julius (Jacob Elordi) anticipate an upcoming move to California ... but nothing will
work out as planned.

Bryce Kass’ script captures the melancholy tone of Shannon Pufahl’s 2019 novel, but film can’t replicate the author’s poetic prose. Absent that — and given that it’s blindingly obvious that we’re about to spend two hours with hopelessly miserable people — this film needs to be more than a mere actor’s showcase.

That said, Minahan and Kass deserve credit for treating gender issues and uncertainty with the same respect and sensitivity that highlight Pufahl’s book.

 

Events begin in the mid-1950s, as brothers Lee (Will Poulter) and Julius (Jacob Elordi) have returned from Korean War service. They gather in the small-town Kansas house that Muriel (Daisy Edgar-Jones) inherited when her mother died. Lee, having long been sweet on Muriel, proposes; she accepts.

 

The long-standing plan — driven by Lee — is that the three of them will move to San Diego, get jobs, and make enough money to eventually buy a house; Julius will be welcome in a second bedroom.

 

However...

 

As this sequence unfolds, the glances that pass between Muriel and Julius are laden with unspoken intensity: hungry, yearning and forlorn. Edgar-Jones and Elordi’s body movements are flirty; the air drips with sexual tension. The snap assumption, at this early stage, is that Muriel will be torn between the two of them.

 

But no; things aren’t that simple. For starters, Julius is gay ... but perhaps not entirely. He’s also much too free-spirited for such a conventional life; he’s a thief and card cheat — which Lee has long known — and thus heads to what he imagines will be a more exciting time in Las Vegas.

 

Yes, this is another story that decisively punctures the surface “wholesomeness” that many people naïvely assume the 1950s represented. Much of what follows takes place within all aspects of the decade’s closeted gay community.

Saltburn: Spicy, seductive and sinister

Saltburn (2023) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated R, for strong sexual content, graphic nudity, constant profanity, drug use and disturbing violent content

Available via: Amazon Prime

By Derrick Bang

Trust the writer/director of 2020’s Promising Young Woman to follow that with an even edgier premise.

 

Having achieved his goal of getting closer to the charismatic Felix (Jacob Elordi, center),
Oliver (Barry Keoghan) soon learns all manner of things about Felix's sister Venetia
(Alison Oliver) and the rest of their family.

Emerald Fennell has concocted a truly unsettling story, populated by cheerfully mean-spirited characters: a horrifying brew of envy, greed and poisonous privilege.

 

The result is mesmerizing, in a macabre way ... although you’ll likely feel guilty — and dirty — the following morning.

 

English boarding schools have been the setting of class-based horror stories ever since Thomas Hughes wrote Tom Brown’s School Days back in 1857. The formula remains unchanged, although modern tastes have allowed the depiction of increasingly deplorable behavior.

 

The year is 2006. Oliver Quick (Barry Keoghan) begins a term at Oxford as a working-class fish out of water, wholly unable to blend with the university’s predominantly wealthy, entitled young men and women. He’s singled out by another outlier, Michael Gavey (Ewan Mitchell), a nerdy math savant, but this “friendship” isn’t destined to last long; Michael is pushy and much too intense.

 

Oliver instead longs to bond with the charismatic and immensely popular Felix Catton (Jacob Elordi), but the class divide seems insurmountable. Even when fate grants Oliver a chance to do Felix a much-needed favor, the latter is unable to repay the gesture with inclusion in his circle of friends. 

 

“He’s a scholarship student,” one contemptuous girl snaps, putting dismissive emphasis on the descriptor. “He probably buys his clothes at Oxfam.”

 

Oliver overhears this.

 

His anguish is palpable; Keoghan’s expression and bearing are beyond woebegone. His slumped posture feels utterly lost, misery hovering over him like a dark cloud. We must remember that he was nominated for a well-deserved Supporting Actor Oscar, for his heartbreaking performance as the abused son of the local Garda, in 2022’s The Banshees of Inisherin (and he was one of the best parts of that film).

 

Felix actually isn’t as contemptible as most of his peers; we can see, in Elordi’s eyes, that his sympathy is rising. He finally punches through his clique’s intolerance and gets Oliver a seat at their cherished pub table, but that almost proves worse; the younger man now is overwhelmed by his unfamiliarity with unspoken “rules” and mocking “politeness.” 

 

Much of that comes from Felix’s American cousin Farleigh (Archie Madekwe), who makes no attempt to hide his snobbery (totally ironic, once we learn more about him ... but his attitude also makes perfect sense).

 

Toward the end of term, when a family crisis rips Oliver’s world apart, Felix impulsively invites him to spend the summer at his family’s estate, Saltburn ... much to Farleigh’s annoyance, who fancied himself the sole guest.

Deep Water: Rather murky

Deep Water (2022) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated R, for sexual content, nudity, profanity and violence

Available via: Hulu

By Derrick Bang

British director Adrian Lyne hit pop-culture gold with 1983’s Flashdance and 1987’s Fatal Attraction. Although his subsequent films were uneven — Jacob’s Ladder, Indecent Proposal, Lolita — they certainly generated interest and controversy, further cementing his status as a purveyor of erotic thrillers.

 

Despite having long tolerated her nymphomaniacal tendencies, Vic (Ben Affleck) warns
Melinda (Ana de Armas) that she has become too brazen and reckless.

Lyne rebounded with 2002’s Unfaithful, which brought a well-deserved Oscar nomination to Diane Lane, for her nuanced role as a cheating wife who comes to her senses a bit too late.

Then Lyne dropped off the map. For two full decades.

 

He has returned in form with this similarly salacious handling of Patricia Highsmith’s 1957 novel, adapted fairly faithfully — to a point — by scripters Zach Helm and Sam Levinson.

 

I’m surprised Lyne waited so long to dip into Highsmith; they’re made for each other. Her morality-bending stories dig deep into the psychological quirks of stone-cold psychopaths; the most famous examples are the methodical impersonator in The Talented Mr. Ripley (and four sequel novels), and the murder-trading playboy in Strangers on a Train. Both were made into superb films.

 

Lyne’s Deep Water is a long way from superb, but it certainly grabs one’s attention, due mostly to the earthy, sexually charged performance by Ana de Armas. This is breathtaking, fearless, all-in acting; she oozes carnal intensity with every breath, word and gesture.

 

To casual observers, Vic (Ben Affleck) and Melinda Van Allen (de Armas) are a content, picture-perfect couple living an affluent life made possible by the extreme wealth he earned as a microchip inventor. Now retired, he publishes a quarterly arts magazine, rides about town on his mountain bike, raises snails as a hobby (!), and is totally besotted with their 6-year-old daughter, Trixie (the utterly adorable Grace Jenkins, in an impressive feature debut).

 

But Vic and Melinda’s marriage actually is one of uneasy convenience: He tolerates her endless string of lovers, as long as she doesn’t break up their family.

 

Unfortunately, her indiscreet, narcissistic behavior — and an insistence being the center of attention — has made their friends uneasy. They’re also concerned about Vic, particularly because he seems oddly unfazed: even when Melinda — inevitably poured into one of costume designer Heidi Bivens’ barely-there dresses — flirts shamelessly with some guy at the many cocktail parties enjoyed by everybody in their social circle. (Ah, how the other half lives…)

 

Affleck plays this role well; he excels at quietly stoic characters who nonetheless have something bottled up inside. Indeed, there’s a bit more than resignation and mild-mannered apathy in Vic’s gaze, when he watches, from an upper-story window, as Melinda drapes herself onto her next likely conquest.

 

(You’ll detect more than a few echoes of the similar role Affleck played in 2014’s Gone Girl, albeit with different plot twists.)