Review #949: 'Frankenhooker' (1990)

Cult director Frank Henenlotter's particularly offensive sense of humour is given free reign in Frankenhooker, his extremely loose adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein novel. Any hints of misogyny during the bulk of the film's build-up can be forgiven thanks to an enjoyably daft climax, during which a female creature made up of various prostitutes body parts and the head of its mad creators wife runs rampant around New York taking vengeance on the various scum-bags encountered earlier in the film and any sleazy perverts who fancy a bit of the stitched-together would-be centrefold model (she is played by Penthouse model Patty Mullen).

Medical school drop-out and whiny-voiced genius Jeffrey (James Lorinz) is about to marry the woman he loves, Elizabeth, when she is accidentally killed by a lawnmower he built. The grisly incident leaves he scattered around the garden, but Jeffrey manages to steal a few body parts and preserve them in a solution of his own making before the authorities arrive to clean up the mess. Distraught at losing his fiancée, he plans to re-build her using the body of a beautiful prostitute, gifting the plump Elizabeth the body she always desired. However, executing his plan proves harder than he realised thanks to a psychopathic pimp named Zorro (Joseph Gonzalez), and so develops a dangerously potent form of crack to lure his potential victims.

Despite being a loathsome and extremely disturbed central character, Jeffrey remains oddly likeable thanks to a lively performance by Lorinz, who delivers monologues to himself in a thick New Jersey twang and maintains an infectiously high energy level throughout. Jeffrey's acts represent the darkest of male fantasies, and the film may have come off as repugnant had Henenlotter not soaked every scene with a knowing absurdity. The scene in which a group of prostitutes explode into pieces one-by-one after smoking Jeffrey's powerful crack particularly treads a fine line between offensive and hilarious. Despite the few laughs to be had, Frankenhooker is still poorly acted (Lorinz aside) and some special effects, which mainly consist of stiff mannequin limbs, leave a lot to be desired. Depending on your exploitation experience, it may go too far or not far enough, but there's plenty of giddy fun to be had along the way.


Directed by: Frank Henenlotter
Starring: James Lorinz, Patty Mullen, Joseph Gonzalez
Country: USA

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie