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Friday, 28 July 2006 |
  Mary Shelley's Gothic novel Frankenstein has probably been made into more movies than any other story, except for Romeo and Juliet, that is. Director Philip Chidel's Subject Two takes Shelley's basic concept and transports it to modern day in a remote cabin high in the Colorado mountains. In this incarnation, Adam (Christian Oliver) is a medical student being chided by his Medical Ethics professor for his lack of understanding of, well, medical ethics. Adam seems to have the idea he is permitted to perform any medical procedures he deems necessary or interesting. You can probably see where this is going. He has also been plagued his entire life by migraines. Needless to say, Adam fails the course and is probably kicked out of school.
Late that night, Adam receives a mysterious phone call telling him to check his email, where he finds an offer to go to Colorado and pursue the type of research the sender knows he is best suited for. Once he arrives in Colorado, he is taken far into the mountains and directed to snowshoe further, following a series of ribbons tied to trees, to a remote cabin where he finds Dr. Vick (Dean Stapleton) who promises to show him the secret to immortality. Dr. Vick then kills Adam, leaves him on a table out in the cold, and eventually revives him.
The revived Adam is distraught by his lack of both physical sensation and emotion, which he expresses so passionately, I wonder what he believes to be emotion. The experiments continue as Vick attempts to fix one problem after another as Adam suffers through death after death and endless side effects.
There may be the core of a good idea here, beyond what Shelley did nearly 200 years ago, but ultimately it is lost in the shuffle. Is it about lack of emotion as some sort of living death? Might work, if Adam didn't emote to profoundly about his lack of emotion. Maybe it's about the ethics of technology or a search for immortality. Unfortunately, none of these ideas is pursued enough to be satisfactory. In the end, it is a clever little idea that isn't realized to its potential. Horror fans will be disappointed by the lack of, well, horror, and indie film fans will be disappointed by the lack of character development. Subject Two is a nice try, but falls short.
Starring: Christian Oliver, Dean Stapleton, Courtney Mace, Jurgen Jones, Thomas Buesch
Director: Philip Chidel
Written by: Philip Chidel
Cinematographer: Rick Confalone
Studio: First Look Studios
Rated: R
Running Time: 93 mins
Release: 2006
Reviewer: John Rice
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