The Heartless Monster

After drifting without an identity for many years, the Pioneer Two Boots Theater is becoming the go-to place for young filmmakers whose movies are too wild and crazy to get distribution. The Anthology used to specialize in this kind of thing but the Pioneer Two Boots has become its bratty younger brother: The movies are experimental, intensely stylish, and loaded with exploitation (sex, blood, and often both at the same time).

October is proving to be a banner month for the wild and crazy crowd so far, with the astoundingly lovely looking "Blood Tea and Red String" last week and now the debut of "Frankenstein's Bloody Nightmare," which begins a week-long engagement tonight.

Something draws underground auteurs to the Frankenstein story, and this is just another retelling with little to offer in the acting department.In fact, it's hard not to nod off in this flick, but visually it's a perfect 10. Shot on Super 8, the tiny gauge format once beloved by home moviemakers, director/producer/star John R. Hand warps this feeble format into something beautiful. With dissolves, light flares, and contrast manipulation layered over color tricks, double exposures, and digital effects the result is a handmade object that looks ravishing. The soundtrack is a discordant array of boops and beeps from band the Greys, and the overall effect is like watching some kind of lost exploitation film from the 1970s cobbled together by a deranged grindhouse projectionist out of damaged film.

The story itself is a drag. Doctor's wife dies while under his care. He resurrects her as a Frankenstein's monster. They have weird monster sex. She kills to stay alive. The end. But, like "Blood Tea and Red String" the technical accomplishments are brilliant. It's just too bad it doesn't have a heart.