The Island of Dr. Moreau
If we haven’t seen a movie in a lot of years, I think there are times when we might forget why we liked it one way or another. I didn’t remember the reasons why I hated “The Island of Dr. Moreau” when my mom and I watched it in 1996. Now that I’ve revisited it, my memory was not mistaken- if anything, my long-ago feelings on this film were too generous.
There’s a documentary of this legendarily troubled production which supposedly dives deep into how this adaptation of H.G. Wells’s classic sci-fi story, which was originally going to be written and directed by Richard Stanley (“Color Out of Space”), and starring Bruce Willis, Rob Morrow and Marlon Brando, turned into a work directed by the great John Frankenheimer and starring Brando, Val Kilmer and David Thewis that everyone hated. I haven’t seen it, but I’m curious if there’s a moment where the producers, after firing Stanley, brought on Frankenheimer, and how much time he had to lay out his vision of this film. I’m guessing there’s not such a moment, because this looks like Frankenheimer just had to run with much of Stanley’s ideas about the film and deliver a film product. It suffers as a result.
David Thewis plays Douglas, a negotiator for the UN whose plane crashes at sea. He is rescued by a boat headed to an island Dr. Montgomery (Kilmer) is going to. Douglas has to get off with Montgomery- they will get him a radio to get help to him- but what he finds is a freak show run by the enigmatic Dr. Moreau (Brando). Moreau is doing human-animal experimentation, and Douglas wants out now. Aissa (Fairuza Balk), one of Moreau’s “daughters,” inspires him to stay. He may not be able to leave as a war breaks out.
Frankenheimer is capable of toeing the line between drama, dark comedy and surreal images; “Seconds” is a hallucinatory experience that finds a balance between all of those things. “The Island of Dr. Moreau” has missed the mark so completely that it’s almost baffling they are from the same director. There are moments, namely when Montgomery does a wicked Moreau impression, but while Moreau’s worldview is well-delineated in the film, none of it lands because the film eventually devolves into madness and insanity. The climactic battle feels like a more frenetic version of the climax to “Nightbreed.” Stan Winston’s creature creations are so cheaply rendered they feel like the ape effects in the later “Planet of the Apes” sequels. And none of the performances are good; everyone truly looks embarrassed to be involved. (And that likely extends to Temura Morrison and Ron Perlman, who are hidden under the Winston makeup, but make no strong impressions.) Few movies have been so soul-crushing to watch.
