Lisa Frankenstein (2024) is a trans love story

“To define is to limit” — Oscar Wilde

Diablo Cody, your voice is so clear in this film it almost hurts. Lisa Frankenstein satiated a part of me that I didn’t really realize existed — the part that craves a version of Jennifer’s Body that doesn’t make me full body cringe multiple times due to humor that became outdated and offensive shortly after the time the film was released. Of course, things like the r-slur still don’t bother a lot of people, but it bothers me. There’s nothing to be found like that in this film, but it is still a deeply provocative film with a lot of elements that make it feel a lot more adult than it is in reality, with its PG-13 rating.

Lisa Frankenstein is Jennifer’s Body meets Weird Science meets May, and I love every single bit of it. It’s been a little while since I’ve watched a movie with a potent trans allegory that is largely unintentional, and this also fulfilled that niche I love so dearly. Diablo Cody said in an interview that the theme in this film is “transformation” itself — she says explicitly “how much change I can go through and still be myself” — so it’s safe to say that while the film isn’t intentionally trans, it’s safe to read it that way. The protagonist, Lisa, is an outcast in every way. She is deeply traumatized from a horrifying home invasion, and she developed traumatic mutism due to it. She doesn’t have any friends, and this is remarked on by people who dislike her and people who don’t throughout the film. It’s easy to read her as any kind of deviant because of these things, and especially as I watched her transform throughout the film and watch her spend less and less time in the literal closet and more time being herself out loud. The first thing I read as trans in the film is when Lisa first cleans Creature up and changes his clothes. As we progress through the montage of trying on clothes, he emerges from the closet in a baby pink wrap robe with feathers — Lisa reacts enthusiastically, and this seems to put Creature off, and he hides, retreating back to the closet and rejecting the compliments. This comes after he tries on 3 or 4 different masculine outfits and Lisa doesn’t really have any sort of major reaction to them. This reads as trans to me as someone who has been disappointed before when my desired presentation isn’t what’s being rewarded, and what is making me uncomfortable is. Transmasculine forced feminization, where transmasculine people are rewarded only when presenting as feminine, and punished or ignored entirely when presenting as masculine is a common occurrence and experience of transmasculine oppression and violence.

To add to this, Creature lives in Lisa’s closet for most of the film. This was intentional on Diablo Cody’s part, as she mentioned in an interview that she made this choice so that she could create queer subtext even though the relationship is ostensibly “heterosexual”. Diablo does view this as a queer story, so again, I think it’s fair game to read this story as trans. This belief is further substantiated by one of the central conflicts that arises in the film. Lisa’s step-mother is a psychiatric nurse, and she continually escalates threats of institutionalizing Lisa. This is a very potent fear for queer and trans people, as there is a very long, morbid, indefensible history of forced hospitalization and institutionalization for the simple crime of being queer, being trans, being different, being deviant. Even if Lisa is not explicitly queer (which I doubt in a lot of ways, since she expresses attraction toward women in the film), this being one of the largest looming threats in the film for her makes it connect for me even more.

Lisa and Creature connect largely due to his desperation to find the parts of him that are missing, gone due to rot. This, again, is a theme I find very trans, even when it isn’t meant to be. I also find it extremely relatable on the level of being intersex and having had parts taken away from me. I’m also on a constant journey to find my parts. It sucks.

For Lisa, it’s obvious that things have changed for her due to the trauma she’s suffered and how drastically things have changed since then, but everyone has moved on, and they don’t really understand why she hasn’t, so they don’t talk about it, and they just blame her for being weird and inconvenient, or ignore her, or pity her, or threaten to have her taken away. Lisa says “time is the wound”, and god. This is largely about the way that it feels to grieve someone who isn’t here with us anymore but it can so easily be read as grieving a person you never got to be, you’ll never get to be.

Of course, there is the very big trans part of the film where after Creature and Lisa fall in love, he reveals to her that he doesn’t have a penis. She is shocked, but immediately reassures him, with a soothing “you don’t need one of those to be a man, it’s actually like the least important part, really, we can do other things” — this ultimately being unnecessary, as Creature has procured a cock for himself. One of the most romantic scenes i’ve ever witnessed, and something I will likely fantasize about for dozens of hours now, Lisa gives Creature DIY phallo. She says something later, that really cements my reading of Creature as trans/masc in my head, when they are holding one another she says “I can’t believe I was ever afraid of you.” and that’s where I started to ball. I think it really kills me in a really specific way when anyone acknowledges how much it hurts to be seen as a monster, even when you sort of look like one. How much it hurts when you know that someone you would kill and die for, has looked at you and felt fear. This is such a gift that Lisa and Creature have given one another. This movie is stupidly t4t and funnily enough, I think if I watch it one more time I’ll be able to easily find a transfem read of Creature. I think Lisa can easily be any kind of trans + GNC with the way that she is characterized throughout the film.

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Anyways, enough of me explaining why this movie is trans. I’m thankful to Lisa Frankenstein for giving me something new and untainted to associate the lightning bolt symbol with. I’m really impressed with everything about this movie. There’s a cheerleader sister who subverts all expectations at every turn, shifting the dynamics and creating an even more stimulating internal landscape for the characters. Cole Sprouse gives an incredible performance as Creature, with hilarious physical comedy and heartfelt nonverbal communication. The soundtrack absolutely rips, with a fantastic needle drop of “Wave of Mutilation” that nearly moved me to tears. I’m glad someone sees how romantic that song really is. Great fucking movie about love, coming of age, alienation, sisterhood, eternal grief and so much more. I will be rewatching this at least a handful of times. I thought it would be fun and cute, and it was. It was fun, cute, funny, adorable. All of the above. It was also horrific, heart-wrenching and painful.

I’ve been in this mood lately where love stories are really good for me. I think I’m really obsessed with things that remind me of the beautiful parts about being alive right now, in a time where it feels really hard to enjoy being alive even when things are good, because there is so much horror. This film reminded me a lot of why I’m happy to be alive, and in love, and trans. I think Lisa Frankenstein will have a big resurgence in some years and become a bonafide cult classic. If this would have come out when I was 13 I would have made it my entire personality.

“Death is temporary, I’ll love you forever”