Aaron Eckhart, an actor who cut his teeth in wonderful roles in films like "In the Company of Men", "Nurse Betty", and "Erin Brokovich", should receive some sort of accolades for being able to talk about a character named "the gargoyle queen" with a straight face. Paychecks are paychecks but it is hard to believe that Eckhart put down a copy of a LaBute or Mamet play in order to Adam, Frankenstein's monster in "I, Frankenstein". While preparing for this role he more than likely had to tell someone "I would love to read your play but I'm too busy practicing my kali stick to play an undead monster". "I, Frankenstein" comes off as a big-budget Syfy Channel film or a visual effects test film, meandering from action sequence to action sequence with absolutely no panache, tension, or excitement. It is simply one big budget green screen action scene after the next with CGI creatures battling other CGI creatures. It is a completely passionless and pointless endeavor meant to appeal to those who would rather watch video game cut-scenes than play the game. It will be quickly forgotten and buried hopefully soon enough to help Eckhart revive his career.
After killing his creator's wife and burying his creator, Frankenstein's creature (Eckhart) has gone into hiding in the Arctic. He planned to hide from everyone and everything and live out his eternal life alone. Eventually though he is attacked by demons which then draws the attention of gargoyles who come to the creature's aide. The gargoyles give him the name Adam (what is a film about immortality without bad religious connections?) and train him to defend himself against the demons. Centuries later, Adam and the gargoyles meet up again in order to stop Charles Wessex (Bill Nighy), a wealthy man who intends to find a way to reanimate life for nefarious purposes. When Wessex discovers that Adam is not just a fictional story but a reality, the battle between the gargoyles and demons grows.
The plot of "I, Frankenstein" is so pointless and unnecessary that I almost felt compelled to simply write "Frankenstein's creature fights demons with the help of gargoyles" and leave it at that. From the very first frame, it is obvious that "I, Frankenstein" is a clone of the mediocre "Underworld" series. It is almost as if someone just rolled two dice with various creatures on them and decided to write an action/horror movie pitting the two groups together. "Ok ok. I got... Swamp Things and angels? Nope. Bigfoot and Mole People? No. Gargoyles and demons! That's it!" Whereas the "Underworld" films had Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight leather (don't act like that isn't the draw of the series) and Bill Nighy as a vampire hamming it up, "I, Frankenstein" has Aaron Eckhart brooding and... Bill Nighy as a demon hamming it up. There is nothing original or interesting about this movie. It almost comes off as someone making a movie based on a comic draw by a dark and brooding high schooler who was bored while reading Mary Shelley in class.
One of the biggest problems with today's CGI spectacles is that there is absolutely no sense of danger and action. Why are we supposed to care about CGI flying gargoyles battling CGI demons? Why even have human characters when your film is just slow-motion battles between this collection of pixels and that collection of pixels? All the more troubling is the fact that there doesn't seem to be a single human in the vicinity of these apocalyptic-level explosions. Why did the filmmakers even bother to include cars on the set when it is obvious that this film takes place in a universe where humanity isn't even present? At least the similarly themed "Blade" and "Underworld" series had enough smarts to have most of the battles take place far away from the seeing eyes of the public. Here, they openly destroy cultural landmarks and there isn't a flesh-and-blood person to be found.
As you walk out of "I, Frankenstein" (hypothetically hopefully) just try and remember one single action scene that you just saw. I fully believe all you will remember is that Adam doesn't look all that bad for being a 200-plus year old collection of rotting bodies and really hoping that Yvonne Strahovski (the film's forced female love interest) gets a better TV gig sometime in the near future. The film simply wastes your time like scenes between video game play that you simply can't skip over.
Someone needs to tell Bill Nighy to stop taking these roles. It is almost embarrassing to see him phone in another "evil creature" villain role. Here he seems almost on auto-pilot. One can almost see him trying to remember what creature he is supposed to turn into that day. I suppose a job is a job and maybe the money is too much to turn away. Hopefully he makes enough money from these films to buy his next boat and retreat back to another charming film.
The only positive elements of "I, Frankenstein" is the effects work. The visual effects crew made huge flying gargoyle battles look about as interesting and believable as they could be. It is also nice to see practical make-up effects being used for most of the demons. These are just actors with prosthetics, something you don't really miss until you've seen enough CGI abominations to be able to see the difference. It gives some of the scenes a more realistic feeling than you might expect. Of course, this feeling is then obliterated by a CGI explosion of some kind.
Luckily, "I, Frankenstein" will be forgotten in no time. I wouldn't even expect it to show up on "Worst Films of 2014" lists. That is how unremarkable and hard to remember this film will be. One simply hopes this film bombs so we don't have to see Colin Farrell as a Merman battling Scorpion People lead by Nighy in some ridiculous CGI battle in the future.
