By Robert Scucci
| Published
Looking for a healthy dose of shameless schlock that’s inspired by a timeless classic but infinitely more grotesque and unhinged? If you head on over to Tubi, I have just the thing for you, and it’s called Frankenhooker. Always on the lookout for the dumbest, most tasteless, and darkly hilarious content that streaming has to offer, I knew I had to watch this one because Tubi’s algorithm knows what I like, and has never failed to deliver films like Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead, Cooties, and Birdemic: Shock and Terror for the sole sake of pushing me one step closer to permanent brain damage, and for that I’m infinitely grateful.
Following all of the expected beats you’d find in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein but with a twist, Frankenhooker is crass, offensive, incredibly violent, and so fun that you’ll find yourself, like its titular character, in stitches from the moment the title card drops until the final credits scroll across your screen.
Looking For Spare Parts After A Tragic Lawnmower Accident
Frankenhooker first introduces us to New Jersey resident Jeffrey Franken (James Lorinz), a master electrician and failed doctor who’s always tinkering on one of his new inventions in his workshop until the automatic lawnmower he makes for his father in-law to be accidentally shreds his fiancée, Elizabeth (former Penthouse Pet Patty Mullen), into what most people would consider to be unsalvageable bits and pieces.
Refusing to believe that Elizabeth is gone forever, Jeffrey decides to use his talent to bring her back to life, but only after finding body parts that meet his exact specifications before getting to work. Storing Elizabeth’s severed head in a chest freezer estrogen bath, Jeffrey decides that the best course of action is to find a sex worker who’s body checks all the buttox (sorry, boxes) that he’s looking for, and seeks out a hot-headed New York City pimp named Zorro to help him find the right woman for his insane experiment.
Becoming increasingly stressed over the ethics of what he’s about to do, Jeffrey drills holes into his own skull, which allow him to become less emphatic so he could pursue his science project without his pesky conscience interfering.
It Takes More Than Two To Tango
At first planning to harvest a single woman of the night in Frankenhooker, Jeffrey instead plans to purchase the time of several women from Zorro so he could measure and evaluate their bodies in his pursuit of the perfect body to be affixed to Elizabeth’s head.
After developing a strain of super-crack that he plans on using to stage an overdose for the woman of his choosing, all hell breaks loose because every woman working for Zorro is looking for a fix and overpowers Jeffrey before he gets the chance to tell them not to consume the drug because it will make them explode (something he hadn’t considered in his self-lobotomized state).
As you would expect, body parts litter the hotel room just as Zorro shows up to check up on his women, and Jeffrey has to flee the scene with garbage bags full of body parts to finish what he started back at his laboratory.
Patty Mullen Steals The Show
Successful in cobbling together a suitable body for Elizabeth in Frankenhooker, Jeffrey channels power from a nearby lightning storm to reanimate his beloved, with grotesque and hilarious consequences.
Awakened with the memories of each crack-addled woman that her body is composed of, Elizabeth stumbles and twitches through the streets, and travels back to New York to turn tricks, wholly unaware of the fact that she’s a walking, talking abomination. Oh yeah, she can also kill anybody who comes into contact with her with beams of electricity.
Though James Lorinz’s Jeffrey Franken is the protagonist in Frankenhooker, Patty Mullen is the star thanks to her willingness to fully explore the body (or bodies) she’s depicted as occupying. Every moment of screen time that centers on Patty Mullen is physical comedy gold because she commits to the bit with so much enthusiasm that it’s surprising she hasn’t starred in any other feature films since.
Streaming Frankenhooker For Free On Tubi
While Frankenhooker is far from high art, it’s certainly a treat for those who love low-budget horror comedy that’s produced for the sole purpose of making its audience equal parts upset and overcome with laughter. If you want to see a timeless classic like Frankenstein come to life in the most absurd way imaginable, you can stream the title for free on Tubi as of this writing.
