Splice

'Splice' is a curious relic. Well, as far as the genetic modification branch of science goes, "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." But the day is not over yet. As the film progresses, so the story grows and the plot develops into what can justly be described a notional masterpiece, containing the suggestive implication that the revealed progress and status of scientific knowledge is selectively deceptive, and we are being insulted and beguiled with less than the true or complete picture. Of course, such things without governmental approbation will not even reach pre-patent research stage, but as this film shows such research could actually be conducted by a closet organisation in order to find out whether it can be done, and such knowledge even when forbidden is revolutionary. So this film is quite telling in its nature. It is directed by Vincenzo Natali, a name with which I am unfamiliar, but if I ever see his directorial mark on any other movies, I'll be taking a closer look. The big name is actor Adrien Brody, who shares a lead role with Sarah Polley as the two 'rogue' geneticists. The story is richly entertaining from the start, and keeps you hooked to the very last scene. It is one of those rare movies that have the hypnotic power to hold my attention all the way through without so much as a break for tea or coffee. A person with ADD would be just as placated by its turns of sentimentality and horror, driven like a machine by the cogpiece of scientific intellect. The script is never boring, with its witty faux-reality in the duel with dilemma and decision that the characters have, and the acting and actors are immensely likeable as you follow their progress from joy to tragedy, as of parents with a newborn child who are sure to learn the hard way of its growing pains into the package as well. The child in question, Dren, a hybrid of human and animal DNA - I will give no more away than that - is just as much an object of sympathy for the viewer as are the main protagonists, collaborative scientists Clive and Elsa (played by Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley respectively; Delphine Chaneac the mutation), who work for a forbidding industry and so have to go underground with their project. From there, the tension mounts as their secret experiment spirals out of control. As I said before, the film is rich in quality entertainment and, like a rich sandwich cake, it is hugely enjoyable to consume but it will be a while before you need or want another helping - that is, a repeat viewing. There are few movies as sustainedly good as this one, and I am surprised I have not heard of the director before, as he has crafted a masterpiece which should not go unrecognised into obscurity or unapplauded by anyone into movie history. It is now one of my favourites. Get it!

I thoroughly enjoyed it. Watched it just after reading about the splicing of mouse genes in the Wuhan lab. Fantastic. Good timing. Fantastical but still a little chilling. Not so scary you can't sleep but enough to make you think. Get a bag of Doritos dippers & a glass of wine. Enjoy !

A full in-depth review of Splice will hopefully be available soon on my own film and TV review site (link in my Amazon profile!) Looking back, it's hard to believe that I'd gone almost a decade without ever hearing of splice. I mean it has one of my favourite directors, Guillermo Del Toro, attached as an executive producer and given the things the film gets into, how I had never heard of this? It was only thanks to a screening of it in university that I ever saw this... and I spent a significant amount of time just processing what I had seen. It's been a while since my first viewing, and having got my head around it... I don't think it's a good film. It's an OK film, with pretty serious issues that weigh it down... but it's a fascinating one nonetheless. I can't talk much about the actual plot without spoiling it, but I will warn you that if you do choose to watch this, be prepared to suspend your disbelief big time and prepare to encounter some massive gaps in logic during the first act. One thing's for certain: from my point of view as a Film Studies student, I could talk forever about Splice. There is so much in here: abjection, anxieties of genetic mutation, and enough to apply so much Freudian psychology that you could choke a Basking Shark with it. I could write tons about Splice in essays, and in fact I have done. Like I say, I can't call it a good film, and I mostly bought the DVD to capture some screenshots for that essay. Still it's an admirable film, with a whole bunch of content packed in. If you're feeling adventurous, maybe give it a try...

It's so frustrating when you are confronted with a piece of art of any sort that - like Splice - has so many intriguing elements and the kernal of a classic which ultimately fails on too many levels for comfort. The central conceit - which is admittedly somewhat unoriginal - is nevertheless a potentially fascinating updating of Frankenstein (itself something of a Promethean homage) for the genome generation. Unfortunately, despite the lovingly created lab-based, almost futuristic sets, the CGI Fred and Ginger - the initial artificially created chimaeras - are less-than-convincing. They LOOK like computer graphics and make it very difficult for you to suspend your disbelief. And even though the overall look of Dren - the ultimate humanoid chimaera - is more convincing (at least once she matures) there is still plenty wrong with her physiognomy. And with her linguistic and emotional maturation. And yet, there is considerable pathos in her character. (Which has much to do with Delphine Chanéac's lovely performance.) The same cannot, however, be said for her creators - played by Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley. Again, the performances themselves are excellent. But the characters seem poorly thought-out. Underwritten, even. In fact, the overriding impression I have is of a movie which is far too short to do proper justice to the whole concept which includes themes of parenthood, feminism, the snowballing of technology into apocalyptic and unforseen directions etc. Yes, I enjoyed the ride. Yes, I laughed out loud on several occasions. Yes, the movie challenged me to confront my own prejudices and attitudes towards its subject matter. And, yes, it managed to elicit a variety of emotions within me which most movies fail to do. Hence the four stars. But I have to stress that I felt incredibly short-changed overall. The relentless pace of the movie meant that too many corners were cut for me. There was too much ellipsis. There were so many themes to be explored and yet, having to shoehorn so many into a conventional film's running time meant that any such exploration was only superficial. Again and again I wished the filmmakers had put their energies into a TV series. Or even a mini-series. (Imagine how monumentally frustrating Twin Peaks would have been if David Lynch had condensed it into a movie rather than into the beautifully nuanced and perambulatory masterpiece of television that it ended up as!) I wholeheartedly recommend you see the film. It did, after all, provoke major debate in my household! (We were still picking it apart nearly two hours after it ended!) But be prepared to be let-down like no other film I can think of!

I was so happy to eventually watch this! Excellent mad scientist stuff! It's far from real life but we should heed the warning to not move ahead with science without caution. Fools rush in where angels feast to tread. More mad scientist stories please.

Aan experiment to make a new life form goes well when a male and female god knows what they are seem to accept each other,but two doctors break the number one law,NO HUMANS ,as they try they get a baby at first with legs and no arms that grows larger each day as they wanted children and to stay out of trouble they take the girl away to somewhere safe,by this time she has arms and is forming into a woman ,but with a tail with a stinger,then one night when she is told off she show s that she has wings,but then things starts to go wrong as she kills the cat and turns on the people that have found out about her and the people who brought her up.this is another good film,recommend it

For the first half of the film, it's okay. Of course, it's absurd and ridiculous, but it's moderately entertaining. Unfortunately, the story tails off (sorry for the pun) after a point and things go from absurd to the point where you're shouting "WHAT THE ****?!" at the TV. Wrap all this up with an ending that's probably just about as ridiculous as the rest of the film put together, and you've got yourself Splice.

This is a great movie with well-performing actors and with intriguing visuals. It is a genre movie, but it achieves to go beyond what you'd expect in several ways. I rented this movie on blu-ray and I decided that I needed to own it because it's definitely worth watching more than once. Besides, it's not really scary, just intensely interesting. I removed a star for predictability in the end, but I added two for unique visuals and for taking this genre into new territory in a bold and profoundly interesting way.

Guter Film. Einwandfreie Ware. Schnelle Lieferung. Alles bestens.

SPLICE is a cunning, creepy and clever Sci-Fi thrill ride. Did I mention "sexy"? No matter. If you want a nice case of the Heebie Geebies, SPLICE will not disappoint. The underlining theme is nothing new. This is Frankenstein told over --but you can forget about gothic villages and peasants with torches. SPLICE's creature finds life in a state-of-the-art Mega Corporate genetics lab. This hopelessly doomed experiment-gone-wrong is the creation of 2 curious and brilliant gene splice jockeys who can't fight the urge to throw a little bit of their own human DNA into the old chromasonal cauldron. Every phase of the creatures development is stunning and even shockingly cool film making. What ya gonna do when your very own monster grows up to be the amphibious, winged, deadly and scrumptious babe of your dreams? Euthanize her? Not the choice of our red-blooded American male scientist--or his young wife intent on mothering a child of her own creation. Things get sticky, hot and incredibly creepy. In the end, nothing good can come of messing around with the laws of creation. Especially in the last 15 minutes of this horror thriller. This is slick and scary sci-fi story weaving. Its wonderfully first-rate musical score is an unexpected delight. But I would hate to give anything away. Go ahead and buy this one. SPLICE is one Blu-Ray that is worth multiple viewing and worthy of a place in your sci-fi horror library.

Good movie

My wife and I watched it tonight and I warned her about the mixed reviews this movie has gotten That being said and considering the other various reviews I read, here goes: I have zero desire to tell you what the movie is about. It did not drag, it got right to it. What we enjoyed the most about it was the fact we never really knew just what genes had been spliced together to create the creature. Watching it fresh like this, we really never knew exactly what to expect and at times, we caught ourselves holding our breath, so much in fact, that I actually paused it a few times. If you're married, have kids & love sci-fi horror genre, I bet you'll like this movie. We both found it to be a better movie than Species in part because throughout the movie, you couldn't help but wonder at just WHAT? genes were used to create the creature. and thanks to ALL those who wrote reviews previously. I told my wife before watching it, that the reviews were a complete mixed bag and that we might find it disturbing..... For us, it's a great flick.

Vincenzo Natali ist ein interessanter Regisseur des Horrorgenres. Seinen Durchbruch schaffte er mit dem bereits zum Klassiker avancierten "Cube", es folgte der vielschichte "Cypher", der Horrrorelemente mit dem Agententhriller verband. Sein neuer Film heißt "Haunter" und bringt neue Facetten in das Geisterhaus-Genre. 2009 drehte er mit "Splice" eine fulminante und auch tragische B-Picture Version über das (über)lebende Produkt von zwei Gentechniker. "Splice" erzählt die Geschichte des Wissenschaftlerduos Clive Nicoli (Adrien Brody) und Elsa Kast (Sarah Polley), die auch privat ein Paar sind, Die beiden hoffen darauf durch das Spleißen von tierischen Erbgut neue Lebewesen zu schaffen. Tatsächlich können zwei überdomensionale Würmer am Leben erhalten werden. Der Arbeitgeber, ein Pharmakonzern, erhofft sich von den Ergebnissen ihrer Arbeit großen Nutzen für die medizinische Forschung und natürlich ne Menge Geld. Gleichzeitig erzeugen die beiden Wissenschaftler heimlich, vor allem Elsa, in den Labors des Konzerns ein Mischwesen aus menschlicher und tierischer DNa, um durch die neue DNA eine Vielzahl von Krankheiten heilen zu können. Doch das Leben der Kreatur hängt von Anfang an an einem seidenen Faden, zumal Schöpfer Clive das Wesen am liebsten wieder töten will. Doch unter Elsas Schutz und Mutterinstikt wächst die Kreatur, die weiblich ist, versteckt von der Aussenwelt im Keller des Instituts auf. Als dieses Domizil zu eng und gefärhlich wird, zieht das Paar mit der inzwischen pubertierenden Dren (Delphine Chanéac) auf eine Farm, die Elsas verstorbenener Mutter gehörte. Das Wesen entwickelt sich rasend schnell und sieht nach kurzer Zeit einer erwachsenen menschlichen Frau sehr ähnlich, hat aber auch Giftdrüsen, einen Schwanz mit Stachel an der Spitze, Flügel und amphibische Lungen und vor allem Launen und Gefühle... Natali orientiert sich sehr stark an den Klassikern dieser Sparte und es geling ihm sehr schnell für seine Kreatur Mitleid zu schaffen, die möglicherweise auch deshalb so unberechenbar wurde, weil sie seit ihrer Geburt von den Launen ihrer Macher, dem Menschen, abhängig war. Mehrfach wurde versucht ihr das Licht auszublasen - alles keine guten Voraussetzungen für eine gemeinsame Zukunft zwischen Mischwesen und Mensch. Die Geschichte ist natürlich alles andere als Neu, aber Natalis Neuinterpretation des alten Gruselstoffes über experimentierende Wissenschaftler, die keine Grenzen kennen, macht Spass und hat den gewissen Cronenberg-Touch, also viel Bodyhorror gibts zu Bestaunen. Der Showdown ist vielleicht zu ausufernd, aber insgesamt ein guter Genrevertreter, auch wenn einige Kritiker "Splice" als schlechtesten Film des Jahres bezeichneten.