REVIEW

Movie Review: Frankenhooker

Written by Casey Criswell
Published January 18, 2007

Young Jeffery Franken is a troubled man. Kicked out of several medical schools, Jeffery is skilled in the arts of electrical biology. His ideas and methods, however, are often too extreme for academia. Living at home with his mom, Jeffery continues his experiments and studies on his own time in hopes of making a medical breakthrough so legendary, the medical world will have to take notice.

One afternoon at his fiancé’s house, they prepare for a birthday party for his future father-in-law. As Jeffery's fiancée Elizabeth unveils her father’s present, a remote-controlled lawnmower, all seems happy and warm in this close knit family. When Elizabeth starts to show her father how the remote works, something horrible happens. Elizabeth is dismembered in a spray of blood as she forgets she is standing in front of the now moving lawnmower.

Distraught at the site of his fiancé being cut to bits, Jeffery does what any semi-mad scientist would do – he grabs Elizabeth's head and a few other odds and ends from the scene of the accident and hides them away. Vowing to bring the love of his life back, Jeffery begins to formulate his plan of creating life and sets out to find the perfect body.

Boy do I love me some cheese. Frankenhooker is quite possibly the pinnacle of cheese and B-movie comedy. With so many elements coming together in one tiny package, any hardened veteran of B-movie fare would be loath to turn away. With many belly laughs throughout, a magnificent dosage of gore, and a plot so laughable you can't help but enjoy, this one now goes to the top of the list for late-night time killers and beer drinkers.

What's there to love about Frankenhooker? A lot, my friends. Starting off this mega cheese endeavor is our plot. A mad scientist who is mourning the death of his girlfriend thinks he can bring her back to life. An admirable notion of course, but Jeffery has to take it one step further. He can't just be concerned with bringing her back; he has to build her a new body as well. While he's at it why not give her a smoking hot bod? She should appreciate that right?

Most definitely a twist on the classic Frankenstein tale, Frankenhooker goes beyond a traditional retelling, retains the classic elements to keep it connected, then strives to cheese it up above and beyond the call of duty. Laughing all the way, they then populate the film with hundreds of crack smoking hookers. How can we not love something as expertly crafted as this?

Moving beyond the plot, Frankenhooker contains so many elements meant to disturb and titillate, it is downright impressive to count the various little quirks sprinkled about. The movie opens on a close up shot of a brain with an eyeball embedded into its frontal lobe. One of Jeffery's many experiments, we watch as he sits at his fiancé’s dinner table working away.

Later, as our star begins to formulate his plan, he decides to have a romantic meal with his fiancé’s head, complete with wine and poetry. With comic results, we watch as he pours wine down her lifeless gullet while reading off his militaristic-tinged love sonnet. Need more proof? As Jeffery begins to doubt himself and his plans for obtaining female body parts, he turns to trepanation to unlock his confusion. "That plan won't work! Back to the drawing board," he mutters as he raises his drill once again. "Don't worry, the hole’s already bored!"

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Falling in love with bad horror films at a very young age, Casey Criswell strives to bring back the classics in today's modern age of horror remakes. Armed with nothing but a DVD player and keyboard, he charges into battle with his mighty battle cry of "I watch crap, so you don't have to!" Casey runs his film blog, dedicated to reliving the finest in horror, science fiction, and the obscure at Cinema Fromage.
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Movie Review: Frankenhooker
Published: January 18, 2007
Type: Review
Section: Video
Filed Under: Video: Comedy, Review, Video: Horror
Writer: Casey Criswell
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