The origin of this salute to Frankenstein can be traced all the way back to 1984, when a young Tim Burton produced a few short films for the Walt Disney company, the last of which was a ditty called Frankenweenie. Starring Shelley Duvall and Daniel Stern, this live-action short was supposed to play in theaters before a re-release of Pinocchio, but the project was shelved and Burton was fired for "wasting company resources" and making something too scary for children. But I guess now Burton and Disney are bros again, seeing as they've made billions of dollars together, and with the success of kid-friendly scare-fests like Laika's Coraline and Paranorman it was time to reanimate the property.
I thought this stop motion remake was a beautiful return to form for Burton. This is more Edward Scissorhands and Ed Wood than Alice in Wonderland. The black and white photography was stunning, and the character designs as you would imagine are well conceived. I also love that the film isn't afraid to deal with the dark subject matter that was present in the original Frankenstein, such as ignorance and the morality of science. Danny Elfman was on top of his game as well, with a score that reminded me a lot of Scissorhands. All in all, it's a great film that any animation, Burton, or old school horror fan would enjoy. If I have one complaint it's that it really did feel like a short film stretched out to make it feature length. This would've worked much better if it was cut down to 40-45 minutes because it's not set on as grand a scale as a Pixar adventure; it works best during the quiet moments, and the loud ones smell like they're there for marketing purposes. Still, I love seeing animated films that aren't made with only drooling infants in mind.
(Watch the original Frankenweenie here)
Rating: A-
One dying sub-genre is the anthology horror movie. I happen to love movies like Creepshow and also love the caught-on-camera style, so seeing this marriage between the two was a no-brainer. Unluckily, all the characters in this film had no brains either. A great concept is squandered by bad characters and not enough connective tissue between the stories. There are 6 "shorts" in all, each directed by a 'notable' horror director. I liked some of the shorts much better than others, with my favorites being Second Honeymoon by Ti West (House of the Devil) and 10/31/98 by the quartet of directors known as Radio Silence. But the main arc of the movie follows the most despicable characters I've ever witnessed on screen. The way the shorts fit into the narrative is that this band of lowlives (who rape and vandalize for fun) find a bunch of VHS tapes in an abandoned house they were looting and start to watch them. It's an interesting concept, to do this in place of just separate title cards for each movie, but the bad taste that these characters leave lingers throughout most of the film.
V/H/S does not at all skimp out on blood, guts, or scares (if you scare easily), but something about it felt too exploitative. It was like the whole thing reveled in these disgusting people, and the graphic violence and gore was put on display merely for our pleasure and not any kind of logical reason. It's a very unique film, and the footage, unlike Cloverfield or Chronicle, actually looks like it could be "real," but there was so much cringe-worthy acting and pointless filth that it was hard to enjoy.
Rating: C+
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