Review of Igor (2008) by Chads. — 19 Sep 2008

In the tradition of Valerie Martin's 1990 Nebula-award-winning novel "Mary Reilly"(later adapted to the screen by Stephen Frears), an igor, like the nameless servant in Robert Louis Stevenson's "Dr.

Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", gets to be the protagonist of his own narrative, stepping out, at long last, from being stereotyped, a stock character usually in possession of a low I.Q., who was first seen in James Whale's original "Frankenstein"(there is no mention of Igor in the 1817 Mary Shelley novella).

The mad scientist, even in Mel Brooks' parodic "Young Frankenstein", is portrayed as the smartest man in the castle; but "Igor", in the film's most clever conceit, reimagines these mental giants as idiots(Dr.

Glickenstein, voiced by John Cleese) and plagiarists(Dr. Schadenfreude, voiced by Eddie Izzard). This igor is like the Will Hunting of igors; he may possess a hump, but he's "wicked smaht", stuck in a malevolent world of chowderheads.

Being that there are no igors of the fairer sex, and since he's straight, when Igor(John Cusack) plays God, he creates woman. He creates Kirstie Alley, but this former lab-assistant calls her Eva(Molly Shannon).

His monster is an actress; a not-so-inside joke about how all female thespians have the potential to be divas. While "Igor" works as an old-school Hollywood picture about the entertainment biz, like most 3D-animated films not made by Pixar, however, the filmic elements are too post-modernist by half; in other words, too many pop culture references spoil the soup.

When the showtunes kick in, it's like watching Tim Burton's take on "Moulin Rouge". But give "Igor" some credit for being insightful about how popular film, historically, and to this day, has a tendency to misrepresent people of all persuasions, in particular, this class of igors.

Igor doesn't walk, or talk, the way he's supposed to; the way we're pre-conditioned to accept his kind, as servants, as people on the margins.