At this point, I’m pretty sick of the haters who claim a certain generation’s love of nostalgia is “cringe.” Like I get it, over the past decade, I’ll admit they milked our yearning to return to the happier days of the 80s-00s a little too hard. Between the love letter to all things 80’s shows such as Stranger Things and The Goldbergs, the flood of new pixel art video games, and disco and new wave music making a comeback, it’s understandable that the general public got a little burned out of it. Not me though. Until things get a lot better in this time period, I’ll be more than happy for the sweet escapism to stuff kid me liked. Is this what it’s like to get old?
I think Zelda Williams (the daughter of Robin Williams, and talented actress in her own right) must have had the same sentiment while making Lisa Frankenstein, her feature length directorial debut. The film follows Lisa (Kathryn Newton), a troubled high school senior who is struggling to adjust to her school. Considered strange by her peers for rarely speaking, Lisa has a much easier time talking to the graves in the abandoned cemetery she spends her time at than socializing with the living. She even has a special favorite grave: a bust of a handsome young man stricken down in his prime. One night in a moment of desperation, she makes a wish to be with him, and it comes true in the way she least expected. Now Lisa has to hide a living corpse (Cole Sprouse) while trying to survive high school as well as her hateful stepmother (Carla Gugino.)
If this movie had merely just taken place in 1989, I would have just counted it as a period piece. However this isn’t just a movie that takes place in the 80s so much as it’s a complete love letter to a very special genre of film we saw in the 80s and 90s that we see much less of today: horror comedy/romance. Not that we don’t see those from time to time these days. But there was just something about these types of movies 30-40 years ago that had an indefinable charm to them. Somehow these movies had so much sincerity and earnestness to them, all while still not taking themselves completely seriously.
Director Zelda Willams, as well as writer Diablo Cody completely understood the assignment on this one. They didn’t just make a nostalgia piece, but a movie that almost could have been released in 1989 without too many people questioning it. Lisa Frankenstein avoids many of the pitfalls contemporary period pieces make. One major one being framing the story and characters through modern morality instead of morality of the time.
While I absolutely appreciate we as a society becoming better people, we have to remember the past was…different. People with ptsd and trauma weren’t given as much patience and understanding as now. Sexism was much more apparent. What I loved about this movie is that it wasn’t just cosplaying as a 1980’s movie, but really captured the spirit of one.
Acting wise, we had quite a few gems here. Lead actress Kathryn Newton really ate her role as Lisa up, giving us an awkward, adorkable teenage girl who has some definite depression and anger issues. Cole Sprouse had his work cut out for him as he had to play a reanimated corpse who is almost entirely mute besides various forms of groans. I’m glad his physical acting prowess was up to the challenge. I equally loved Liza Soberano as stepsister Taffy, a popular cheerleader who actually really has a good heart. And I definitely can’t forget to mention Carla Gugino’s performance as evil stepsister Janet. As an actress I’ve always admired, I’ve never wished more for something unfortunate to happen to one of her characters as in this movie.
What I consider a plus for this movie is something many may think of as a weakness: this movie is pretty cheesy. And it’s 100% meant to be. The acting, while still good, was covered in a layer of cheesiness. The plot, while compelling, went into very little detail about how any of it worked. The audience learns very quickly to stop asking how any of the science behind this work, and to just sit and enjoy what happens. Also, true to any kind of 80’s horror, comedy or otherwise, the characters are all pretty dumb to say the least. I’m glad this was a comedy, because if this was an actual serious horror film, I’d be pretty frustrated at everyone’s stupidity in this.
It’s movies like Lisa Frankenstein that give me a reason to never truly be tired of nostalgia, even if I know it exists to cater to people like me. I’m just glad Zelda Williams is already showing how much she loves film through this movie. She, like me, just wants to watch more of the things that made her happy as a kid.
