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SPLICE
(***)
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Movie Review by:
Jim "Good Old JR" Rutkowski
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Directed by:
Vincenzo Natali |
Written by:
Vincenzo Natali and Antoinette Terry Bryant |
Starring:
Adrien Brody, Sarah Polley, Delphine Chaneac |
Running time:
104 minutes
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Released:
06/04/10 |
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Rated R
for disturbing elements
including strong sexuality, nudity, sci-fi violence and language. |
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" ...a fascinating take on the genre that doesn’t unfold in the expected
ways..."
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I went into the new horror movie “Splice” fully
expecting to see one kind of movie and wound up seeing an entirely different one
instead. This is not an entirely unusual occurrence because plenty of movies
open up with ad campaigns designed to make them look like things that are
completely different from what they actually are--remember a couple of weeks ago
when “MacGruber” was released with trailers and commercials that suggested that
it was a comedy? The difference is that for the first time in a while, the
difference was actually a positive thing. Based on the ads, I assumed that it
was going to be little more than a cheesy knock-off of “Species,” the silly 1995
monster movie best remembered for displaying the pulchritude of Natasha
Henstridge and the scenery-chewing abilities of Ben Kingsley and Alfred Molina.
(Do you suppose the two of them spent their downtime on the “Prince of Persia”
set reminiscing over those good old days?) Instead, in one of the happiest
surprises of what has otherwise been a fairly dismal cinematic summer, it turns
out that “Splice” is a fascinating take on the genre that doesn’t unfold in the
expected ways and is often as creepy and deranged as an episode of Glen Beck's
show though always infinitely more lucid, intelligent and entertaining.
The film stars Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley as Clive Nicoli and Elsa Kast, a
pair of hotshot genetic engineers who are experimenting with splicing the DNA of
several different animals in the hopes of creating a brand-new organism
containing all sorts of material that will be of scientific and commercial value
to the biotech firm that is underwriting their work. Upon successfully creating
a pair of creatures (nicknamed Fred and Ginger and resembling the offspring of
an uncooked loaf of bread and one of the sandworms from “Dune“), Clive and Elsa
hope to take the next logical step and see what happens when human DNA is added
to the mix but they are quickly shot down by their higher-ups--they would much
prefer that the two spend their time isolating and perfecting the promising
protein that they have been waiting for and besides, using human DNA would be
illegal, unethical and generally a pretty bad idea no matter what. However, the
two are not going to let pesky legal and ethical concerns get in the way of
their pursuit of scientific breakthroughs at all costs and surreptitiously begin
to create a new creature using human DNA as part of the recipe. Not only does
the mixture take, the resulting embryo grows at an extremely accelerated rate
and before long, it transforms into a creature resembling a cross between a
jackrabbit and the thing that popped out of John Hurt in “Alien.” At that point,
Clive wants to destroy it and end the experiment but Elsa, a woman who refuses
to have children of her own as the result of her own particularly traumatic
childhood at the hands of a mother who denied her virtually everything,
instantly bonds with the thing and insists on keeping it alive. Besides, since
it is continuing to grow and age at a rapid rate, it will die naturally before
too long and they will be able to study its entire life cycle in the process.
Time passes and the creature, dubbed Dren (Delphine Chaneac), soon demonstrates
a keen intelligence and other surprising attributes to its proud parents in the
lab storeroom where it has been stashed to keep it away from prying eyes.
Unfortunately, their concentration on Dren causes them to lose focus on their
other experiments and when they literally blow up in their faces, the company
begins to clamp down on the facility and Clive and Elsa are forced to move Dren
elsewhere. Luckily (or not), Elsa still owns the isolated family farm that was
the location of all her own childhood traumas and they wind up setting up shop
there. The trouble is that as Dren continues to grow and develop, she begins to
undergo feelings and changes that she is unable to understand or process and
which her ersatz parents are equally unequipped to deal with--after all, if you
think riding out puberty with a normal adolescent is difficult, try doing it
with a super-strong mutant with a tendency to deploy new and unexpected
appendages at the drop of a hat and sports a tail containing an extremely
dangerous stinger. At a loss as to what to do, Elsa finds herself reverting to
the lessons learned from her own maternal model while convincing herself that
her cruelties are being performed in the service of science. As for Clive, he
finds himself developing a stronger bond with Dren but that too only inspires
more trouble and eventually leads to a Grand Guignol-style finale that pretty
much defies rational description.
“Splice” was co-written and directed by Vincenzo Natali, a filmmaker who caused
a bit of a stir in 1997 with his feature debut, the sci-fi head spinner “Cube,”
and then kind of drifted away into the worlds of direct-to-video features and
episodic TV. Right from the start of “Splice,” however, he demonstrates as sure
of a directorial hand as has been seen in anything in the horror genre of late.
The film itself is a bit of a hybrid itself in the way that it combines the DNA
of the films of James Whale and David Cronenberg, two of the most effective
practitioners of the mad scientist subgenre. From Whale, Natali has extracted a
strain of morbid black humor that offers up a number of big and wholly
unexpected laughs throughout at just the right time--the scene in which an
important presentation turns into a big mess is a hilarious bit of gross-out
humor that manages to top itself in the next scene with an absolutely perfect
piece of dialogue. He also handles the character of Dren in much the same way
that Whale handled the Frankenstein Monster--as something to be looked at with a
certain degree of sympathy instead of fear. By inspiring us to look at her as
someone with real feelings and emotions instead as just another slobbering
creature, it adds an extra level of poignancy to the proceedings that help the
film work as an emotional drama as well as a horror film. From Cronenberg, he
nails the weirdo body horror stuff but also effectively creates an oddball and
sometimes downright unsettling atmosphere that is of our world without ever
feeling a part of it--a place where the rules of normal society no longer really
apply and where anything goes, including the consequences.
And yet, “Splice” is not simply an example of a young filmmaker copying the
tropes of his elders because he has nothing of his own to offer. In fact, he
goes about telling his story in the strong and confident manner of a filmmaker
who has a vision that he wants to share with his audience and the technical
skills required to bring it off. Most importantly, he stays true to that vision
throughout without ever tampering it down in the hopes of making things more
audience-friendly. Instead of shying away from the increasingly dark and
perverse nature of the material and going for a more conventional approach, he
embraces it wholeheartedly and the results may startle even the most jaded
horror fans. (Put it this way--this is the film that “The Human Centipede” more
or less wanted to be.) He also knows how to get strong performances from his
actors, not always the greatest consideration in a film of this type. The
casting of Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley, two actors who aren’t particularly
known for their work in this particular genre, is exceptionally brilliant
because they are both talented performers and they both give off the kind of
oddball, outsider vibe that fits in perfectly with their characters, both of
whom see themselves as different and better than average people because of their
particular skill sets, and this helps make their subsequent actions far more
convincing than if they had come from a couple of blander and more
straight-laced types. The killer performance, however, comes from Delphine
Chaneac, who is simply incredible as Dren. Her simultaneously sensitive, scary
and sexy turn is a marvel to behold and may be the best to occur in the genre
since Angela Bettis’ work in the great and underrated “May.”
As fans of horror films know all too well, this has not exactly been a
particularly fruitful period for the genre--when even a figure as revered in the
field as George Romero turns up with a surprisingly substandard work like the
recent “Survival of the Dead,” you know that things are getting pretty grim.
“Splice,” however, is a considerable exception to the current rule and one of
the best films of its type to come along in a while--a work that could seem at
home both in the art-house and the grind-house. The only drawback, however, is
that wildly deceptive ad campaign that I mentioned earlier--a bit of work that
seems to be designed specifically to lure in viewers looking for just another
mindless grossout, which it most certainly isn’t, while pushing away those in
the mood for something strange, cerebral and off the beaten path, which it most
certainly is. If you are part of the latter group, I assure you that “Splice” is
infinitely better than the one promised in the trailers. If you are part of the
former, I assure you that while it may not be the barf-bag epic that is promised
in the trailers, it does contain many of the elements that you are presumably
looking for in a horror film--smart writing, weirdo monsters, a couple of clever
plot twists and a moment that may not top the list of weirdest sex scenes in the
history of cinema but which will comfortably find a notch in the mid-twenties at
least.
I cannot believe I'm saying this about a horror film, but Splice is the best
film released so far this summer. |
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SPLICE
© 2010 Warner Bros. Pictures Distribution
All Rights Reserved
Review © 2010 Alternate Reality, Inc.
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