Splice: So who am I supposed to be rooting for?

I've been watching some singularly bad crap lately. Legion comes to mind, which was just...awful, and yesterday I watched Splice. Apparently the movie was out in 2009 already, but it only came into the theatres two weeks ago, at least in my country.

Since I don't do premieres usually, since I hate overcrowded theatres, and I went on holiday for a week about three days after the movie came out, I was hoping to catch it when we returned. Well, I came home four days ago, only to find out that the whole Splice movie had already left the theatres.

Now I know why!

I still don't know what this movie is about. Is it about how we shouldn't meddle with nature? Is it about why disfunctional retards aren't supposed to have children? Is this a tale of justice?

Let's go through the whole thing, shall we? (pssst, this means SPOILER, so don't read if you don't want to know. But since you don't want to watch the movie--honestly, you don't--you might just read on).

For those who haven't seen the movie: a scientist couple who work at NERD (no, really), have spliced all kinds of DNA and have built some kind of new creature because they want to get a specific kind of proteine that will cure TB, cancer, and what not. Their current project consists of two moving lumps of meat called Ginger and Fred, but even though G and F's existence is considered pretty cool, they won't get any more funding because the lumps of meat can't produce enough of the proteine. SOOOO, the two scientists decide to secretly combine all their spliced animal DNA with human DNA (how is this possible at a monitored lab?), and they produce a fast-growing little girl that first looks like a really big bald kangeroo mouse without front paws, and later mysteriously grows into a somewhat weird-looking, bald hottie with far-set eyes.

Anyway, things go terribly wrong, but not in a logical way.

Firstly, for scientists, these people are the least logical folk I've seen in a long time. Ok, this may be a stereo type from series like ReGenesis, but if you're a scientist and you've just succeeded in CREATING A NEW, INTELLIGENT SPECIES, I highly doubt you'd even consider killing it because of moral reasons. You'd want to analyze it, study it, publish articles about it and fuck your company because even if this illegal, there will be SOMEONE out there to take you into protection because: NEW Species!!! The entire movie, these people keep taking outrageous chances, and then they keep coming back on their decisions for reasons that are no longer valid. They literally make a new human species and the first thing Adrian Brodie (I think his name is Clive in the movie) wants to do is kill the critter because he hadn't wanted to let the embryo come to term anyway

NO! Scientists don't think that way, at least not the kind of scientist he is supposed to be!

The female scientist, his lover, who claims she doesn't want to have HIS baby, is all cooey over the new hairless and rather frightening brat, but has no idea how to deal with the thing. Throughout the movie she keeps screaming at Clive to "DO SOMETHING!!!" whenever anything goes wrong with the creature, and at the same time she refuses to listen to any of his valid reasoning why they should, like, kill it.

Apparently they don't experiment on her, which I would have done if I were a die-hard scientist. Oh wait, they aren't scientists, they are retarded baby sitters. The safety measures of their fascility (NERD, ) are laughable. They don't have any sluices or lock chambers ANYWHERE, and their equipment malfunctions the moment 'there is too much pressure'. Huh. Right. Nobody else at the fascility knows they have been breeding a new species, apart from perhaps one curious scientist, who turns out to be Clive's brother in the end. Right before he is killed by the by-the-pretty-terrible kid, whom the scientists have dubbed Dren (they never watched Farscape, then.)

Anyway, after their very unscientist-like reaction to this great opportunity of unparallelled research material, they smuggle Dren out of the lab IN A CARTON BOX and hide her in a remote farm that used to be the female scientist's home. There, they lock her up in the barn. Yeah, it's a remote farm, and they lock her up in the drafty old barn. Before they can do so, Dren escapes and tears into a rabbit, eating its bloody entrails with relish. Apparently she likes meat, but they don't give her any meat, because 'She doesn't eat meat.'
'Are rabbits vegetables then?' Clive asks with rare humour, but his insane spouse claims that that was 'a mistake.'
Huh. Ok.

So, they lock her up and Dren has NOTHING to do, because they don't give her, like, a tv, or let her roam outside on the REMOTE farm, but keep her locked up at all times. She only has company when either of her 'parents' are around to talk to her. In her loneliness, Dren befriends a cat, only to have the insane female scientist, whom I will refer to as IFS from now on for brevity's sake, take it away from her, claiming that it can make Dren sick. Dren throws a temper fit and gets severely scolded, then left all by herself.

So, they don't let her eat what she actualy likes and probably needs to stay healthy.
They keep her locked up in a drafty old building.
They won't let her have any company.
They refuse to give her anything to actually amuse herself with, apart from a barbie and some dress up clothes.

So far, so good. Hey, they're new parents and everyone makes mistakes, right? After Clive dances with Dren in the barn and realising that the way Dren tilts back her head exactly the same way IFS does, he confronts IFS with the fact that she's used her own cells to produce this daughter. She more or less confesses, and nothing more happens. Well, the next morning, IFS feels sorry and presents Dren with the cat she's just taken away. In a fit of spite, Dren kills the cat with her stinger tail, and threatens her 'mom' when said Mom slaps her in the face for killing the cat. Then Dren steals the key to the barn (which they actually rarely lock, unless that is done off-screen), and happily prepares to go and have some fresh air. Unfortunately, IFS sneaks up on her and clips her with a shovel.

Then, and this is so utterly wrong and moronic it made me consider just turning the thing off and do something worthwhile with my time, she ties Dren up on a table, CUTS AWAY HER DRESS, thereby totally dehumanizing her, jabs some anaesthetic into her tail, then doesn't wait for it to start working, and chops off Dren's tail, taking both the stinger and the poison sacks with it, addressing Dren, who happens to be made of one of her ovals, remember, and so is her own daughter, as subject DC-4558 (or something) all the time.

This woman is NUTS! What the fuck is wrong with her? Why does Clive stay with her??? Ok, apparently IFS's childhood was rather shitty, but come on, this is completely insane!

So Clive comes home, watches his spouse put the bloody tail piece in a box and drive off to the lab, whistling, to get the proteine they apparently HAVEN'T THOUGHT TO GET FROM DREN UP UNTIL NOW. Riiiight. Ok, Clive sees his daughter/pet all naked on the table and gets a good view of anorectic booby. A seed of lust is born. The next thing that happens is that she seduces Clive out of his pants and he ends up banging her on the stable floor.

That's right. He is so enamored of this bald weirdo he's brought up as a mixture of pet and daughter that he fucks her. And remember, he's tried to kill her about three times this movie. He doesn't even LIKE her. He must miss having sex badly--oh wait, that's not true, he's been doing his spouse in front of the girl, too.

IFS then enters the barn. How far away from the lab IS this place, anyway? Ten minutes? Anyway, she drives off in a rage, and Clive follows her. On foot, I guess, since they only have one car. Again, they leave poor confused Dren all alone, wondering what's she's done wrong. So Clive comes home to find IFS not packing but seated at the kitchen table, and then he somehow manages to shift the blame from fucking his scientific daughter to 'we fucked up' instead of 'I fucked her'. That's pretty good, Clive, yeah!

With the child abuse now complete--she may not go where she wants, she may not eat what she likes, she may not keep pets, she may not have sex--, Dren's had enough and changes sex overnight. Oh right, I forgot to mention this. Remember Ginger and Fred, the lumps of meat, Dren's non-human prototypes? In the middle of the presentation that should have gained NERD (snicker) eternal fame, Ginger and Fred do not mate, as was the idea, but tear each other to pieces because apparently Ginger changed sex in like an hour, became male, and the two males decided they didn't like one another. NO ONE OF THE SCIENTISTS NOTICED THIS!!! God, are they stupid or not?

Right, so Dren is now male and wants only one thing...pointless violence. Oh, and sex with her, pardon, his mum. In a finale that is aimed at horror but does not surpass boredom, Clive is killed, his brother is killed, their boss is killed, and IFS is raped by her offspring. In mid-rape, a dying Clive manages to distract Dren, PREVENTING HIM FROM EJACULATING, one would think, and finally IFS bashes Dren's head in.

The end.

No. IFS proves she truly is insane, goes back to work and turns out to be pregnant by Dren. Eh, how is this possible? As far as I know getting stabbed doesn't make you come, unless you're into snuff. NERD is going to experiment on her baby. After all, as she says with a soppy-sad desperate smile, what can go wrong? Great Scot, hasn't she wreacked enough mischief? Does she want another poor oppressed creature to get maltreated by a couple of idiot scientists?

God, this was a moronic movie. Especially the fact that the scientists who are die-hard enough to break all the rules then suddenly start talking about moral ambiguities, and then break every moral rule they can find grated on my nerves. A final question, what animal has three fingers? Dren has hands with three fingers and a thumb, but as far as I know all mammals have four toes and some kind of thumb-like extremity, not three. The only animal that comes to mind with similar hands is...a velocitas raptor, or a T-Rex. So Dren is 50% human, and the rest is desert mouse, wasp or scorpion, fish, bird and kangeroo?

God, this is a moronic movie. If they would have made Dren a human girl and the scientists Alien, this movie would be banned as child pornography. This really sucked all kinds of bad, and the more I think about it, the worse it becomes. yuck.

Yeah you don't need to ejaculate to impregnate somebody. There are sperm cells in pre-ejaculate.

Penguin wrote:

Yeah you don't need to ejaculate to impregnate somebody. There are sperm cells in pre-ejaculate.

True, but if you're only partly human and 3/4s all different kinds of animal...what would the chance be of one of those very few pre-ejaculate cells reaching mommy's womb...besides, Elsa (I finally rememberd IFS's name) fucks Clive two times and she doesn't want kids, so I presume she's on the pill, which makes her becoming pregnant even less believable.

Eh, I'd say the most unbelievable part is that their genes are compatible to begin with. Cross-species breeding doesn't work.

Penguin wrote:

Eh, I'd say the most unbelievable part is that their genes are compatible to begin with. Cross-species breeding doesn't work.

Male donkey + female horse = mule.
Female donkey + male horse = hinny.

Ghost in the Machine wrote:

Penguin wrote:

Eh, I'd say the most unbelievable part is that their genes are compatible to begin with. Cross-species breeding doesn't work.

Male donkey + female horse = mule.
Female donkey + male horse = hinny.

II see your mules and hinnys and raise you a
Zorse(Zebra + Horse)

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You can get Zonkys too... I'll leave you to figure that one out...

Also Lygers (Also Tygons... Spotting a pattern in this naming system yet? Hint: They're all awesome! ;p)

Note: Those things are freaking huge!

Witness:

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Anyway.. the movie... I havint seen it, but a friend wants me to... We're doing a presentation on 'body horror' later this month soooo this and Human Centipede are both on the study list. (along with Videodrome... so it's not all bad!)

I really liked it because I like movies about really fucked-up people. Both these people have serious character flaws that made them fascinating to watch, and it really worked as a horror film to me. The whole point of the movie is that these people are totally fucked up - Clive is an incredible doormat and indecisive, while Elsa has inherited the insane parenting drive from her mother. You aren't supposed to be rooting for anyone in this movie. It's like a trainwreck. It's got the same theme as The Prestige, I suppose, and the same sort of problem.
Also, there's no message to the whole thing, but I sort of like the fact that them being pushed off the grid by society's fear of their work is what led to it all becoming a disaster. That's a lot better than "THERE ARE THINGS MAN WAS NOT MEANT TO KNOW", in my book.

Electron Blue wrote:

I really liked it because I like movies about really fucked-up people. Both these people have serious character flaws that made them fascinating to watch, and it really worked as a horror film to me. The whole point of the movie is that these people are totally fucked up - Clive is an incredible doormat and indecisive, while Elsa has inherited the insane parenting drive from her mother. You aren't supposed to be rooting for anyone in this movie. It's like a trainwreck. It's got the same theme as The Prestige, I suppose, and the same sort of problem.

hm. I'll give you the fucked up, but as a horror movie it totally didn't work for me. It was so predictable I could see every single thing coming. Even Clive's Oh-hell-I-guess-I-LIKE-bald-freaks moment. I could even give you that because they are scientific geniuses, they lack certain common rules and values. But that's not the case! If these people were proper scientists, they would have created several Gingers and Freds and TRIED OUT what happened if two males were in the same room. And what would happen if they were both female. In a real lab, you CANNOT use a 4-million dollar incubator machine without anyone knowing what you're doing, and you sure as hell wouldn't be able to mash it to pieces and get away with it. Also, you cannot leave that kind of fascility with a CHIRPING CARTON BOX and not have some guard asking what you're moving.

What I mean to say is, I would have enjoyed a movie with flawed people. But I can't stand the stupid, unbelievable, SLOPPY way Splice is put together. Ok, you're a doormat. Does that mean you'll fuck your dog if it looks at you invitingly? or your daughter? If Clive had been a womanizer, I'd have said 'Ok, he's into everything that has twolegs and this is the ultimate exotic experience.' Since he isn't, him going for Dren makes no sense at all. This is not me being squeamish at either the bestiallity or the incest-like themes. I've read and even written worse. What bugs me, is the wtf-ery of the whole thing.

It's more that they completely fail as scientists than as--no, hell, they fail as ordinary people as well! Tell me, if you for some reason would end up in the same position, as in, you have a small, unpredictable, but somewhat sweet and obviously intelligent creature in your possession, do you, when she (outrageously) displays skills at reading:

a. give her a scrabble board
b. encourage her reading with all you have, giving her a pad and a pencil, books, learning tapes, etc

Insane parenting skills my ass. Elsa is a dangerous lunatic without a scientific feeling in her entire body, and Clive is...just utterly worthless. They're not flawed, they're not real, and there isn't a moment in the movie that I am not aware of this sad fact.

Quote :

Also, there's no message to the whole thing, but I sort of like the fact that them being pushed off the grid by society's fear of their work is what led to it all becoming a disaster. That's a lot better than "THERE ARE THINGS MAN WAS NOT MEANT TO KNOW", in my book.

Maybe. To me, it's more like their own fear and stupid decisions leads to the disaster. Especially since, if they had bothered to get that proteine from Dren when she was still a kangeroo mouse, and showed it to their weird-ass accent superboss, said boss would instantly have forgiven them for making monster stew and given them a good place to bring up Dren.

Nope, it failed as horror, it completely failed as a drama, and worst of all, it sets up for a sequel, which makes me feel a little sick inside.

I don't get the feeling these characters were ever meant to be sympathetic, which seems to be your automatic assumption (and to be fair, it's a pretty reasonable assumption and a good reason it doesn't work for you). I just watched it to see what happened, really.
I mean, there's only so much I can say. These people are meant to be utterly fucked-up and wrong, and I enjoyed seeing everything go down in flames because of it.
On the note of Clive, though, I seem to remember thinking that was rape at first and the only reason he didn't resist was the poison-stinger tail, but it's been a long, long time since I've seen this movie.

They don't need to be sympathetic, just show some sign of reason, either as brilliant scientists or as twisted, but otherwise normal-thinking adults, and they don't. Neanderthals would have been more adequate handling the situation. I don't mind fucked-up, but I do mind inhumanly moronic.

But I am repeating myself

I might have missed that, but as far as I remember, Clive is just treated to a strip show and kind of goes with the flow. I don't think the stinger was involved. No rape. That would have made it better, because then he'd have a reason to have sex with her. Now he just did. Lots of kissing was involved, too, if I remember correctly. Considering Dren's tongue is about a foot long, it would have been fun if she'd choked him...

Well, as far as I can tell, Elsa was supposed to be criminally insane hence the whole 'dehumanizing' scene and all the backstory with her mother indicating she might have the same mental disease she had. Clive, as I said, I just thought was a waste of human life who happened to be really smart and connected to a very driven (and insane) woman.
Also, you made me want to watch this movie again.

I'm also probably really biased because I liked the monster design, CG and weird sci-fi crap in general, so I may be excusing some things. Subjectivity and all that.

After reading this synopsis, I gotta say, it sounds like it's poking fun at pro-life stances. Elsa the Psycho with a traumatic past uses her DNA to make Dren, doesn't know how to handle this bugger, and tries to take care of it, but doesn't provide emotional or physical things needed to bring a child up healthily. That's me, though, and obviously the stance would be exaggerated for the sake of a good horror flick.

Also, inbreeding! :D Great way to study a new, man-made species! Since, you know, you are so going to make more after the rousing success of the first.

I agree with Kleine. I can't imagine any actual scientists being able to break lab rules like that without getting caught in the beginning, or such a sloppy experiment to begin with. There's no logic in it, and their apparent "solution" defies logic at every turn. This entire thing sounds ridiculous.

One more thing on the splicing thingy, Hybrids are usually sterile anyway.

Yup. Not Dren, though. He can impregnate his mommy even though

1. he is made up out of 12 different species, so yeah, hybrid
2. he doesn't finish because, well, killed in mid-bang
3. she is struggling all the way and probably takes a good lengthy shower AND, if she's any good, a morning after pill
4. she may be on the pill anyway
5. HE DOESN'T ACTUALLY HAVE A DICK! did you see it? I didn't!

Oh yeah! Movie science.

Quote :

2. he doesn't finish because, well, killed in mid-bang

Pre-cum.

Mr.Doobie wrote:

Quote :

2. he doesn't finish because, well, killed in mid-bang

Pre-cum.

Still:
1. he is made up out of 12 different species, so yeah, hybrid
3. she is struggling all the way and probably takes a good lengthy shower AND, if she's any good, a morning after pill
4. she may be on the pill anyway
5. HE DOESN'T ACTUALLY HAVE A DICK! did you see it? I didn't!

Quote :

3. she is struggling all the way and probably takes a good lengthy shower AND, if she's any good, a morning after pill
4. she may be on the pill anyway
5. HE DOESN'T ACTUALLY HAVE A DICK! did you see it? I didn't!

3a. Taking a shower (no matter how long and thorough) is not going to help wash semen out of your vagina. Are you going to say she douched with Coca-Cola too, and that should've prevented it?

3b. The morning after pill isn't a complete failsafe. It can fail to prevent pregnancy. Not only that, but maybe she didn't take it. We don't know that. Yeah, it makes the movie stupid and even less realistic, but the characters have acted completely outside of logic before to carry out the plot, why stop now?

4. The question here is might. While she was 9 months pregnant she might have hired Ollie the Magic Bum to falcon punch her in the stomach and cause a miscarriage. She might have gone to get an abortion. She might not be on the pill, her boyfriend and her could've been using a rubber. Or they could be bare-backing and been incredibly lucky (or he was infertile). Just because a character might doesn't mean they are

5. I haven't seen the movie, but maybe they didn't show the dick because depicting dicks in a movie isn't seen as being in very good taste. I'm not saying that's right or wrong, just that it's something not normally done and something left to the imagination. I've seen hundreds of sex scenes in movies where they don't show the guys dick. Does that mean the sex never happened? No.

So all you're left with is... hybrid.

Your move.

Uhhhh, Mr Doobie?
According to the good old wiki here, you are unlikely to get preggers from pre-cum unless there is prior masturbation.

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Quote :

There have been several studies that conclude no sperm is present, and thus, pre-ejaculate is ineffectual at causing pregnancy. It is likely, however, that pre-ejaculate that follows a recent ejaculation will contain sperm, as some ejaculate is always left in the duct after orgasm.

So either the sterile hybrid has magical balls in hir Bulbourethral glands or busted a nut prior.

Observed wrote:

Uhhhh, Mr Doobie?
According to the good old wiki here, you are unlikely to get preggers from pre-cum unless there is prior masturbation.

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Quote :

There have been several studies that conclude no sperm is present, and thus, pre-ejaculate is ineffectual at causing pregnancy. It is likely, however, that pre-ejaculate that follows a recent ejaculation will contain sperm, as some ejaculate is always left in the duct after orgasm.

So either the sterile hybrid has magical balls in hir Bulbourethral glands or busted a nut prior.

Yeah, but it's not impossible to become pregnant from pre-cum. That's why the "pull-out" method is not the suggested course of action when you're trying to prevent pregnancy. It doesn't take magical balls, just a lack of luck.

So, yeah... hybrid.

Mr.Doobie wrote:

Yeah, but it's not impossible to become pregnant from pre-cum. That's why the "pull-out" method is not the suggested course of action when you're trying to prevent pregnancy. It doesn't take magical balls, just a lack of luck.

So, yeah... hybrid.

To be fair though, If Hybrid is our only argument against the pregnancy it ain't a weak one.
Pregmancy would be required considering the massive species gap caused by being a hybrid made by 'splicing' up 12 species.

Also many of the structures found in female and male genitalia are the same/similar and the metamorphosis of female to male by Dren may have mostly consisted of shifting. As Clive fucked Dren and presumably came, and sperm usually live for several days outside the balls, it actually would have been more likely that IFS was pregnant with Clive's kid.

Observed wrote:

Mr.Doobie wrote:

Yeah, but it's not impossible to become pregnant from pre-cum. That's why the "pull-out" method is not the suggested course of action when you're trying to prevent pregnancy. It doesn't take magical balls, just a lack of luck.

So, yeah... hybrid.

To be fair though, If Hybrid is our only argument against the pregnancy it ain't a weak one.

I'm not saying it's any more likely that Dren made the girl pregnant. I'm simply pointing out the logic kleine used to debunk the pregnancy was, for the most part, pretty weak.

Maybe you're not really supposed to rood for anybody?

I liked Splice, personally. I could go into a point-by-point rebuttal of kleine_kat's take (which probably won't help because her(?) main beef seems to be not with the plot but the Clive and Elsa being unscientific idjits)... But I'll let Movie Bob do it for me, since he says it all more eloquently than I could (plus I haven't watched the movie in a while):



ETA: On the "Uncomfortable fan art" front: Neytiri in a landslide.