The Fly II

The Fly II...1989...105 minutes...rated R...starring Eric Stoltz, Daphne Zuniga, Lee Richardson, and John Getz...written by Mick Garris, Jim and Ken Wheat, and Frank Darabont...directed by Chris Walas

So, at the end of the last film, Veronica was in a family way after her very interesting (in the Chinese sense of the word) encounter with Seth Brundle. Well, her delivery was a bit hard, and poor Veronica passes away giving birth to her son Martin. Martin is adopted by Bartok, the company owner who had invested in Seth Brundle and his telepods so as to have something for all their time and trouble. Martin is an extremely fast grower and fast learner...a genius just like his father. Bartok is thrilled, because the telepods are still...problematic. Of course, Martin is also like his father in more ways than one...and while the day of his metamorphosis hasn't occurred, everyone knows it's on its way.

If the synopsis sounds a little involved and complicated, well, so is the movie. Honestly, while the screenplay is chock full of ideas (and yes, I use phrases like "chock full". Deal.) about what would happen after the events of Cronenberg's film, I never got the sense that there was an overarcing theme to the movie. You have a bunch of ideas and not a real firm sense of what kind of movie "The Fly II" wants to be. There's a romance, there's intrigue, there's lots of gross fly effects...what there isn't is a lot of focus. Sadly, here's where the sequel falls short of the original.

In the original movie, you have a small cast focusing on the story of one man's horrific journey caused by his intellectual recklessness. Here, you have a larger number of people dealing with the aftereffects of the first story...which is probably more realistic in some sense but certainly not as tight as the Cronenberg film. Yes, this movie is to a large extent Martin's attempt to find his own place in the world, and about the price to regain his humanity...though in some ways he never had humanity, so I think more should have been played on those themes. But that's me. It's still a good effort, and obviously had more effort put into it than many sequels.

I give "The Fly II" 2.5 telepod-reshaped dogs out of 5.