Bounding Into Halloween: It’s Toxic Love on Night 29 With ‘Frankenhooker’ And ‘David Cronenberg’s ‘Shivers’
It’s the final hump day of October, and we’re going out with a bang! We have a bereaved amateur scientist who tries to rebuild his deceased love, and an apartment complex that’s filled with more thirsty people than the entire Sahara Desert. Turn off the lights, close the door, and throw on some Barry White because it’s time for a little romance.
Frankenhooker (1990)
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The first round of coital intrigue is from Frank Henenlotter (Brain Damage, Basket Case 1-3), and it’s one of the greatest 80s movies to come out in the 90s. It stars James Lorinz (Brett Weir from The Jerky Boys movie) and 1988 Penthouse Pet of the Year, Patty Mullen.
A graphic, over-the-top spoof of Mary Shelly’s 1818 Gothic Horror novel, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, this is Frankenhooker.
Things aren’t all flowers and good cigars for New Jersey native, Jeffery Franken (Lorinz). Aside from having to live in that dreadful part of the country, this bioelectricity “specialist” drops out of med school to work the pleb life at a local power plant.
His fiancée, Elizabeth (Mullen), fully supports his idiotic decision, or at least until she’s chopped to pieces by an automatic lawnmower during a birthday party. To put it lightly, Jeffery completely loses his s—t.
Jeffery salvages what few parts of Elizabeth that he could, and then has a dinner date with the gore pile. Unsatisfied, he drills a hole into his skull to calm his nerves, and that’s how he gets the “brilliant” idea to bring her back to life by using the limbs of dead sex workers.
He lures these ladies of the night back to a hotel where he gives them a sample of this new “super crack” he created, and it leads to one explosive night.
The hilarious B-movie has been a favorite among horror fans since it became a hit on VHS. The story is absurd, but the witty script compensates, and the practical effects are enough to satisfy any gorehound.
Lorinz gets the quote of the month with “Some people need drugs. Some people need booze. I just need a little surgical assistance.”
Frankenhooker can be found shambling down the sidewalks on TUBI, if you “wanna date?!?” — and the trailer is below:
Shivers (1975)
The next feature in this two-some of carnal intrigue is from the master of morbid Zen, and the Godfather of Body Horror, “King” David Cronenberg (The Brood, Scanners, The Fly), with his feature debut.
It has been called “The Parasite Murders,” “They Come From Within,” and the French know it as “Frissions,” but we call this movie David Cronenberg’s Shivers. Set your receptors for “Low-Budget” because things are about to get a little messy.
Residents of the isolated “Starline Towers” apartment complex near Montreal have their lives turned upside down, sideways, front-to-back, and every other position imaginable when they’re infected by a highly contagious parasite that turns them into sex-crazed maniacs.
Originally developed by Dr. Emil Hobbes (Fred Doederlein) to replace failing organs, he decided to make the parasite a “combination of aphrodisiac and venereal disease that will, hopefully, turn the world into one beautiful mindless orgy.”
That may sound good on paper, but it completely backfires when he tests it on the residents of Starline Towers.
King David’s first conquest was a box office success, and it started him on his campaign to rule the entire Body Horror subgenre. It’s pure grindhouse with imagination, style, and gritty charm.
While this might not be as philosophical as The Brood or a masterwork like The Fly, it shows that natural talent for filmmaking that will eventually lead Cronenberg to the mountain top.
Shivers can be contracted on TUBI, and here’s the trailer for ya, eh:
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