Frances Stein

Director - P.J. Woodside (Lucid, The Creepy Doll)
Starring - P.J. Woodside, Scott Cummings (Lucid, Spirit Stalkers), and Cody Rogers (Fatal Encounters, Nashville)
Release Date - 2015
Genre - Horror/Sci-Fi
Format - DVD (Personal Collection) (Screener)

Rating (out of 5):

     The other night I had a little Frankenstein movie double feature but I went about it unconventionally.  Most people would have pulled out the old Universal and Hammer Frankenstein flicks but I'm not most people.  I decided to check out some Frankenstein films that are not that well known and ones that took liberties with the original Frankenstein story written by Mary Shelly back in 1818.  The first film I saw was the 2011 flick Frankenstein: Day of the Beast.  I then followed that up with Big Biting Pig's Frances Stein.  I was getting the Re-Animator vibe from the film's artwork and this excited me.  I loved how simple it was and it looked pretty cool.  I reached out to director and star P.J. Woodside who was nice enough to send a copy my way.  Thanks P.J. for letting me check this one out.

     The film follows a well known scientist who is known among her colleagues as a brilliant mind.  She works exclusively in memory retrieval and her work has been part of some controversy which results in her marriage crumbling.  Her husband, another brilliant mind, has moved on to a younger scientist and have now wed.  On top of it all, she is now suffering from seizures and her former lab assistant is stalking her.  She has secretly been working on her memory retrieval experiments in a secret lab hidden in a rented apartment.  When her former assistant digs too deep she is forced to kidnap her ex-husband's new wife to use a guinea pig where it is revealed she is dying.  She plans on transferring her mind into his new wife with the help of her ex-husband who is conspiring with her because he still loves her.  

     I love when a Frankenstein film fully submerges itself in the story but makes some changes to make it stand out slightly.  I hate when the film plays on the title and delivers a movie that has nothing at all to do with the original story.  Frances Stein is one of those flicks that cleverly references something very popular but does not follow up on the title.  In fact, it does not deliver on the story nor the type of film the poster paints.  The acting in this one is great for the most part.  The cast all works very together and create some very suspenseful scenes together.  I was not expecting the film to be as well acted as it is.  The entire cast delivers some amazing performances.  With that being said, the seizure scenes really brought P.J. Woodside's performance down.  I suffer from seizures, and though they're different kinds of seizures, I have never seen or witnessed seizures like she has where she is able to power through them to complete dire tasks.  This was written in to move along the plot but really did not sit well with me and how they were handled.  The story for this one honestly has nothing to do with the Frankenstein stories.  The film plays on the name but follows a completely different scenario that mirrors a sci-fi flick and not horror.  The film also moves as a snails pace and suffers from being over written.  The film tries so hard to fool the audience but fails to fully capture their attention.  Also, the film's poster makes you think of Re-Animator and even goes as far as to show the iconic glowing green serum that reanimates the dead but the film has nothing like that.  That was a huge fucking let down.  Finally, those of you looking for clever kills in the name of science will be very let down.  The film does not really have any on screen kills until the final scene and they are very lackluster.  The practical effects are minimal and do nothing to make them believable.  Overall, Frances Stein is not the movie you are expecting.  It is a sci-fi drama at best with little to nothing to do with the story the title references.  The acting is great but that is as far as I can really go with it.  Skip this one unless you are in the mood for something different.