30
Whether or not one should tamper in God’s domain remains a matter of opinion, but Victor Frankenstein provides evidence that mere mortals should not mess with what Ms. Shelley hath wrought.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
40
This reimagining features some fun production design and a performance of undiluted bug-eyed flamboyance from James McAvoy as the titular pale student of unhallowed arts, but its reservoirs of energy and ingenuity run dry long before the finale, leaving the film to lumber to its half-hearted conclusion.
38
Victor Frankenstein is, despite bravura performances from committed young leads Daniel Radcliffe and James McAvoy, all kinds of obnoxious and pointless.
0
By going exactly where you think it’s going, Victor Frankenstein doesn’t so much invent a fresh origins story as it essentially repeats, with a few uninteresting new details, all the same stuff we’ve seen in the other 457 Frankenstein movies.
42
Portland Oregonian by Marc Mohan
The best and creepiest sequence involves a sort of beta test, during which a patchwork chimplike creature is brought to life and rampages about.
25
San Francisco Chronicle by Mick LaSalle
A bleak, tedious enterprise, shot in earth tones and Gothic gray and blue.
25
Deformed from the start, it confirms the very thing argued by its narrative – namely, the folly of unwarranted resurrections.
25
Miami Herald by Rene Rodriguez
Most of this is tedious instead of unintentionally amusing.
30
The Hollywood Reporter by Sheri Linden
McAvoy and Radcliffe are actors with charm to burn, but it’s only in brief moments that their characterizations cut through the film’s pandemonium, while the jokes they’re called upon to deliver land with a thud.
60
Screen International by Wendy Ide
This Grand Guignol riot of rotting animal and Godless creations is great fun. However, of the cast, it is only McAvoy, walking the line between madman and genius, who fully manages to hold his own against the spectacle with which he shares the screen.