When H. G. Wells’ The Island Of Dr. Moreau was first published in

1896, it was attacked by critics as sensationalist, tasteless and perverse.

“It has been stupidly dealt with…by people who ought to know better,”

Wells countered in an interview in 1897. Wells would probably utter exactly

the same words if he was to sit through John Frankenheimer’s film.

It opens on a tiny inflatable raft holding Edward Douglas (David Thewlis),

the last remaining survivor of a plane crash in the South Pacific. Dying of

thirst, he is rescued and taken to an unnamed island whereupon he is

confined by his enigmatic hosts to his room. The father of the island turns

out to be Nobel prize-winning geneticist Dr. Moreau (Marlon Brando) who,

aided by his assistant Montgomery (Val Kilmer), has begun splicing animal

and human DNA in an attempt to create the perfect race.

Screenwriters Richard Stanley and Ron Hutchison have attempted to update

the novel by altering the process by which the doctor operates,

substituting genetic splicing for surgery.

However, like Jurassic Park before it, although the practical

pitfalls of this process are made apparent, the moral implications are

never properly confronted and the screenwriter’s changes therefore fail to

add any new dimension to the novel.

Aside from the fact genetic engineering didn’t exist when Wells wrote the

novel but does now, the whole reason for altering the story at all is

faintly mystifying — the main thrust is still the same: man shouldn’t play

with forces he doesn’t understand.

Stan Winston, whose spectacular make-up and effects work on (among

others) Aliens , Terminator 2 , Jurassic Park and

Batman Returns have earned him four Academy Awards, seems to have

misfired here. It is obvious a lot of thought and work went into the

production of the special effects, and animal behaviorist Peter Elliott was

consulted in order to create as realistic creature movement as possible.

The digital effects department then used state-of-the-art computer

enhancement technology to blend human movement into animal movement and

then back again. Although this is clever, innovative and, doubtlessly

biologically accurate cinematically, it often makes the creatures’ motion

look stilted and animated, almost like characters in a computer game,

rather than fluent and lifelike, resulting in unfortunate unintentional

laughs.

Despite one particularly harrowing scene, in which Douglas witnesses a

hideously deformed mother giving birth, it is difficult to take the whole

thing too seriously. The creatures look like extras who have just wandered

off the set of Deep Space Nine , the rats who attack Douglas look

like they’ve just wandered out of Jumanji and Brando can’t seem to

resist playing his role with his tongue in his cheek.

Thewlis, who gave such a mesmeric performance in Mike Leigh’s bleak

London-based drama, Naked , is here hopelessly miscast and spends

most of the film unhappily trying to suppress his broad Mancunian accent

and failing. Kilmer and Fairuza Balk, who plays Moreau’s ill-fated

daughter, are both adequate (although lovers of the book will find

references to Jimi Hendrix and the like grating). However, to be fair, both

struggle in woefully underwritten roles.

Finally, it seems a little ridiculous in this age of pollution,

deforestation and nuclear testing and waste, Douglas needs to be marooned

on an island of lunatics before he realizes the only real difference

between civilized man and the animals is our ability to destroy nature.

The high-point of the movie is a bold display of jaw-dropping visuals

during the opening credits and an early dream sequence very similar to

those used by director Ken Russell in his 1980 film Altered States

(also about experimenting with DNA). However, although spectacular, they

don’t make The Island of Dr. Moreau , ultimately an untidy mishmash,

worth the admission price.