Splice

From the medieval Jewish legend of the golem, laterreanimated by Mary Shelley as Frankenstein’s monster, comes the idea thathumans might have the power to create life in something like our own image.Usually, the story suggests that our image is flawed, distorted by arrogantself-regard and a heedless lack of wisdom. Playing God is dangerous.

The rapid advance in genetic engineering gives newurgency to the old legend. In Splice,a couple of biochemists, Clive and Elsa (Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley), travelthe road of those rabbis and Dr. Frankenstein while conducting experiments fora pharmaceutical giant. The corporate titan wants to isolate a protein thatcould cure Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s, even cancer. Its executives arehappy to pay for the creation of new creatures whose biological material can beharvested for the next generation of profitable wonder drugs. But Elsa, withher reluctant boyfriend Clive in tow, crosses the line when they splice humanwith animal DNA.

Pushing the frontiers of science is their rationalization.Elsa in particular speaks of boldly going where no one has ever ventured. What Splice shows so well is that humanmotivation is a complex mechanism with many hidden springs.

The human-animal hybrid that results from theirexperiment is a remarkable thing. Dren, as Elsa names her, grows to maturity asrapidly as most animals. She is hairless, with a long tail and three-toed feet,but otherwise resembles an exotic human. She cannot speak, and emits birdlikesquawks, but can understand our language and communicate through arrangingScrabble chips.

The mind of Dren in unknowable, but the psychologyof her “parents” is fascinating. Elsa, who has resisted Clive’s interest inhaving a child together, becomes very maternal with Dren, caring for her insickness, teaching her, even dressing her up and showing her how to applyeyelinerthings of which her callous ideologue mother disapproved. Thedisturbing pull of sexual attraction begins to lure Clive down the dark forestpath of incest and bestiality as Dren matures. The biochemistry couple raisesDren in the abandoned farm of Elsa’s childhood, with its Victorian Gothic househaunted by ill memory.

One thing is apparent even before the most dangerousproblems manifest themselves: Dren is hard to kill.

Canadian director and co-writer Vincenzo Natali (Cube) has crafted a suspenseful,thought-provoking, grim tale where science fiction meets the thrill of horror.Visually imaginative, well paced and lacking the slack screenplay, flabbyproduction and cheesy pyrotechnics of Hollywood,Splice is entertaining, smart andchilling. Delphine Chaneac’s wordless performance as Dren is a remarkable bitof acting. Like Frankenstein’s monster seeing his reflection, her eyes flashwith the realization that she is not like everyone else.