n a not-very-atmospheric house laboratory overlooking the California beach known as Blood Cove, the mad Dr. Monroe Lazaroff (Butler) works with his hideously scarred assistant Salisbury (Knight) and his beautiful assistant Dr. Ula Foranti (Alison Lees-Taylor), furthering the research pioneered by the late Dr. Frankenstein. His purpose: creating an invincible weapon against terrorism.
But when his greatest creation, a finned half-man half-fish (Marshall), escapes into the sea, it looks like six years of work have gone down the toilet. So Lazaroff travels to Shellvania and digs up Frankenstein's original monster (Furbish). Before long, the California coastline is rocked by titanic battles between two separate creatures in rubber suits whose idea of martial artistry consists of swatting at one another ineffectively while saying "Raaaaar."
Among the civilians this inconveniences: the perpetrators of a nude beach layout from Frisky Kitty-Kat magazine, including photographer Bill Grant (Winckler), assistant Dezzirae (Dezzirae Ascalon) and irritatingly flamboyant makeup artist Percy Featherstone (Canavello). These may not be the likeliest protagonists for this kind of thing, but it does permit the insertion of several gratuitous (albiet appealing) topless photo shoots. Bill is a hero without any notable charisma, Percy can be counted upon on to say the stupidest thing in every conceivable situation, and Dezzirae is, more or less, just there.
There's also a werewolf, a ghost and porn star Ron Jeremy.
A movie unworthy of its extras
Frankenstein vs. The Creature from Blood Cove is advertised, in its advance publicity and DVD materials, as a loving tribute to the great monster-movie icons of the past. It has all the proper ingredients, including (bland) black-and-white cinematography, over-the-top acting and a titular monster who is treated as an object of pathos as well as horror.
In practice, it works about as well, and is about as appetizing, as a harmonica carved from a turd.
Why? Well, in part because nobody involved seems to have thought out exactly what kind of movie this is supposed to be. Is it a horror film in the tradition of the Universal classics? Well, fine ... but there is no persuasive atmosphere, no tragic resonance, no conviction among its cast of bad actors. Is it a parody? Well, fine ... but none of the jokes are funny, and the most obvious comic-relief character, Percy, seems an attempt to multiply the most annoying mannerisms of Harvey Fierstein by 12 without coming close to achieving any of that actor's subtlety or charm. Is it an excuse for occasional striptease sequences? Well, fine ... and a couple of the ladies are downright lovely ... but whenever one of those arrives, the story itself stops as dead as Frankenstein's monster should be.
It is more than possible to make a monster movie that works equally well as horror and humor. The original Universal films managed it. This thing doesn't have the conviction or the timing to juggle that many tones, or the skill to make any individual scene work on the level intended. The obtrusive, jokey cameos by personalities that include Lloyd Kaufman and Ron Jeremy are equally off-putting, rendering the whole less a "loving tribute" than a total mess.
The DVD includes two making-of documentaries, audio commentaries, audition footage and deleted scenes, which are together more enough to establish that some production companies put too much effort into making the DVD extras when too little goes into the making of the movies.
