Starring Adrian Brody, Sarah Polley, Delphine Chanéac
Directed by Vincenzo Natali
★★★
Good grief, here’s an interesting one; ethical warnings, parental fears, the cost of opening Pandora’s Box and oedipal desires, all in the one film.
Splice, the latest shock horror from The Cube’s Vincenzo Natali, is an example of that great movie marketing that does the circuit from time to time, the kind that excites some and appals others in equal measure. Over the last while this film has been turning industry boffin’s heads and firmly making itself heard. How firmly? Why its director even had the audacity to dare describe it as our beloved ET, coupled with the kind of activities we’d all rather not imagine our lonely alien friend having anything to do with.
The film begins as ‘too cool for school’ scientists Clive and Elsa (a bit too, too cool for school) are making genetic science history with a couple of rather bizarre looking creatures, artificially created in their lab for the benefit of scientific advances in animal protein or some such.
In light of this break through, the pair can’t wait for their meeting with the Chairman of N.E.R.D, the company they work for, as they are eager to get the go ahead to move on to the ‘next stage’; combining animal and human DNA. To their dismay, they are turned down and despite protesting about the possibilities the study could have for disease research, the corporation is only interested in fast cash (boo!) and want to put all of its resources into marketing the protein product they have already created. Not the sorts to take a refusal easily, they secretly conduct their own experiments and eventually make a successful combination splicing various animal DNA with that of a human.
Due to the highly controversial nature of what they are doing they decide to freeze the embryo in storage. However, at the last minute Elsa has other ideas and is all of a sudden determined to see it go full term. Eventually persuading a very reluctant Clive to go along with her, the two agree to let this happen just for their own curiosity and for what they might learn from it. The gestation period completes much faster than anticipated though, and before they know it they have to deal with a rapidly growing animal/human hybrid, which Elsa names Dren.
Splice succeeds very well in putting forth its cautionary tale; whereas other stories warning of the perils of DNA research might focus solely on the medical ethics and be content with generic Doctors A and B, here not only are so many of the relevant questions so cleverly raised, but the blind ambition and personal flaws of the lead characters adds much welcome richness to the plot.
It’s not as grotesque or heavy going as some media makes it out to be, nor does it take itself too seriously. It is a horror film and is mostly occupied with creating suspense and a feeling of dread but it is also, when it wants to be, blackly comic.
Where it disappoints is with the child/creature itself; Dren is an overly clean hybrid of easily recognisable human and animal appendages. After seeing various parts appear you get the feeling they are to suit plot devise instead of being a supposition of what such splicing might actually create. While David Cronenberg’s excellent The Fly made for pretty disgusting viewing, its science fiction treatment in the same territory seemed a lot more plausible. Towards the end of this film you begin to feel like you’re watching an episode of the X-Files and not what the suspenseful build up might have delivered. It’s a pity because otherwise it’s a successful and intelligent treatment of a subject that usually tends airs toward the silly and barely credible. Worth viewing but could have been a lot better.