I, Frankenstein

I, have seen this movie somewhere before

The story of this movie takes place directly after Dr. Frankenstein dies hunting down his creation. The "monster" buries his creator in his family grave, and is immediately set upon by demons. He kills one, but the others get the drop on him, and his life is saved by two members of a holy order of Gargoyles. The Gargoyles take him back to their base camp and introduce him to their queen. The queen's second in command tries to get her to kill the monster, so he cannot be used against them. She spares him, gives him demon killing weapons, and sends him on his way. A couple of hundred years pass, and the monster is set upon once again by demons, after trying to be left alone in the wilderness ( can we say Hulk anybody?). He then gets tired of being pursued and takes the fight to the demons front door. Trying to get answers to some questions that seem to have been plaguing him, and defeat the demon menace once and for all.

This movie is basically a less intelligent version of "Underworld," which I guess can't be too surprising since the man that came up with "Underworld" also wrote the comic book version of this movie. It is "Underworld" just with no classicism/slavery reference, and Frankenstein in the place of Michael Corvin. This is more straight forward, Gargoyles are good (more or less), Demons are bad, Frankenstein is a creature of unfortunate circumstance. Done and done. Not saying that this movie's story line was awful, just bland. I like how they addressed the whole "What do we call the monster?" thing. The Gargoyles went with Adam (since he was the first of his kind I imagine), the Demons went with Frankenstein (since most people make the mistake of calling the monster Frankenstein anyways, and he was just giving him the family name). I like the whole demon descending to hell when killed, and Gargoyles ascending to heaven when killed. I just didn't like the tactics of the Gargoyles. We know that there a set amount of demons in the world, and that these demons have no way of getting back to earth by any traditional methods. So why did it take these Gargoyles so long to dispense them? I also didn't really like how the Gargoyles seem to be just as easy to kill as the demons, and somehow they are still fragile even though they are made of stone. On the other hand, at least the story line didn't have any mention of the overplayed Vampires and Werewolves, and it brought back some older classic protectors in their place.

The acting was great by two very important people. Aaron Eckhart and Bill Nighy. It was nice to see Eckhart out of his element a little bit and taking the role so seriously, and Nighy was an absolute scene thief. Nighy has been, and will always be the defining actor in any film he does (yes, that even applies to "Pirates of the Caribbean"); however, with their supporting cast's performance it is easy to see how these two can stand out so much. The two lead females seemed to be miscast, and under utilized. Making their characters more like set pieces then actual story drivers. The same can be said for any of the Gargoyles or Demons. You could put anyone else in the spot for these characters and they would still just be filler between Adam Frankenstein hitting things with his sacred sticks, and him not hitting things with his sacred sticks. I guess that is more of a story line issue than an actual acting issue, but I feel that they could have done something to make their characters more memorable.

The look of this movie was breath taking at times, then "hard to keep from laughing" at others. An example: the transformations of the Gargoyles, as well as the death sequences of both the Gargoyles, and Demons are great to look at; but, whoever did the make up for the Demons while they are in their Demon form must have watched too much "Tales from the Crypt." It seriously looks like they are trying to make fun of the demons by having them wear some rubber masks they picked up from a dollar store. I would have expected better from a creative team I assume is trying to be taken seriously. I really don't understand why they made Adam Frankenstein attractive here, this is literally the only movie I can think where the monster had some sort of sexual appeal and it is disturbing
. The fight sequences aren't really that memorable, but that's only because there are so many movies out there with better fight scenes that actually might be worth your money.

Final Verdict: Netflix it If you want to see what I can only hope is a prelude to a live action "Gargoyles" movie, I guess this can apply for that. It is a good brainless movie to put on when you are trying to nurse a hangover.