‘The X-Files: I Want to Believe

“This is God’s work.”

The X-Files is formative television that quite literally helped shape the modern slate of genre programming. Its creator, Chris Carter, will forever have a blank check for masterminding this epic feat and being responsible for some of the franchise’s greatest and most innovative episodes. That being said, he’s also accountable for some of the franchise’s biggest fumbles. Carter is a storyteller who carries a lot of reverence for horror and science fiction classics, including a passionate fascination with Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein’s Monster. Carter has riffed on the Frankenstein’s Monster mythos multiple times over in his various productions, with The X-Files being no exception. Carter returns to this well in The X-Files: I Want to Believe, which would be much more successful if he hadn’t already tackled it in one of the series’ greatest episodes — the Emmy-winning “The Post-Modern Prometheus.” 

This leaves this feature film-sized story left to explore odds and ends that can’t compare to Carter’s previous takes on the concept. That being said, it’s rather apt that Carter would return to play the role of Dr. Frankenstein to his own creation as he resurrects this cold corpse and attempts to breathe fresh life into it by cobbling together random scraps, with the end product simply resulting in a messy abomination. Mary Shelley’s Monster deserves empathy and compassion, whereas The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn deserves to be misunderstood. It’s a project that, while incrementally better than its predecessor, is still fundamentally flawed and merely reminds the audience of what a disappointing misfire I Want to Believe was the first time around. In Vrach Frankenshteyn, Chris Carter completes his bold monstrosity. Unfortunately, it’s a largely pointless endeavor that will leave fans wanting to raise their pitchforks and torches in protest, rather than praising this reanimated atrocity.

For those who are seeing The X-Files: I Want to Believe for the first time, the film presents a fairly routine “monster-of-the-week” storyline that involves a disgraced former priest whose apparent psychic visions reveal a Russian underground human trafficking and organ harvesting operation that’s run by a mad scientist who is trying to play Dr. Frankenstein. It’s an incredibly pedestrian plot that’s not done any favors by its disjointed storytelling, regressive character dynamics, and a complete lack of motivation on the villain’s part. There’s a shaggy foundation to the original film that, in theory, could have been improved by a proper director’s cut. Unfortunately, I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn doesn’t solve any of these problems and, if anything, even magnifies some of them.

Carter’s new R-rated director’s cut promises more gore and body horror, but this was never what made The X-Files such an entertaining success. Atmospheric tension was always essential to the experience, which is arguably stronger here than in the original theatrical cut. However, this is not enough to redeem this mediocre movie. Making the movie “scarier” and more mature was never its problem, and it’s a decision that’s ultimately irrelevant when its story just lacks the proper juice and plays out like a forgettable monster-of-the-week episode.

The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn takes the concept of faith and “wanting to believe” and pushes it to its extreme. While apt, this still feels a little reductive for a series in which these characters have seen and done everything over the course of 200 episodes. Mulder (David Duchovny) and Scully’s (Gillian Anderson) motivations are all over the place here and too haphazard. They really just do whatever the narrative requires of them in order to move the plot points along. It deflates all the tension and gravitas of The X-Files’ series finale and reduces Mulder’s fugitive status to a casual afterthought. That’s not to say that another half-hour focused on these elements would be an improvement. However, it’s still such an odd way to begin the movie that feels so disconnected from the series’ canon. If Carter simply wanted to tell another standalone monster-of-the-week story, then it would have made more sense to just set this story somewhere within The X-Files’ first seven seasons. This would have frustrated fans for completely different reasons, but it would at least ring more true. 

One of the oddest decisions in I Want to Believe is to make Father Joe Crissman (Billy Connolly) a pedophile, let alone one who has molested over three dozen boys. I Want to Believe acts like Father Joe is just a quirky, eccentric psychic, which feels even stranger. He’s not completely off the hook, but there are moments where the film feels like it’s glorifying his faith and determination, as if this should excuse his horrendous crimes. Simply being accused of these atrocities and being left with a tarnished reputation might have been the better approach to this character, rather than actually committing these sex crimes. The character is such a mess and almost a caricature of the individuals that are featured in the series. His storyline also has a very disappointing and blasé resolution that would have fallen short in a standard X-Files episode, let alone a movie. It’s a conspicuous element that never feels natural, like an extra limb that’s been grafted to a body. 

Similarly, Scully’s whole subplot about a young boy with a seemingly untreatable condition also feels detached from the rest of the film and is a clumsy way to pad out the narrative and reaffirm the character’s faith. Eventually this plot dovetails with I Want to Believe’s grander storyline, but it’s in such a telegraphed, eye-rolling manner that lacks the nuance of even some of The X-Files’ lazier episodes. A sequence in which Scully Googles stem cell research, prints out her findings, and underlines the phrase for emphasis is a particular low point for the film and the character. Unfortunately, it wasn’t excised in Carter’s director’s cut. 

To this point, the actual differences between Vrach Frankenshteyn and I Want to Believe’s theatrical cut are fairly minimal. Father Joe’s psychic visions are slightly more extreme, and the morbid science experiments linger a little longer, but it’s still fundamentally the same movie. Surprisingly, the biggest change is the removal of a completely unnecessary exchange between Mulder and Scully regarding Samantha Mulder’s disappearance. This dialogue was a flawed decision in the theatrical cut that came across at the film’s attempt to reheat some of the core series’ greatest hits, even if it made no sense to return to this story beat at this point in the franchise’s timeline. It was a messy exchange that never made sense, and so Vrach Frankenshteyn deserves credit for its removal. 

Curiously, I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn clocks in at 98 minutes, which makes it ten minutes shorter than the original version. Some other minor character-building discussions between Mulder and Scully are trimmed, even if many of these excisions aren’t particularly noticeable. It’s worth pointing out that I Want to Believe’s physical media release contained deleted scenes and a Special Edition Unrated version that did the same thing that’s accomplished by this fancy rebranding, even if the cuts aren’t the same.

The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn is not some hidden holy grail that turns a bad movie into a hidden gem. It’s a director’s cut that’s more performative than anything else. At the end of the day, it’s nice that Chris Carter gets the chance to complete his vision, even if that vision’s differences will be inscrutable to casual viewers. It’s always nice to have The X-Files back in the spotlight, whether it’s through an over-the-top LEGO set or Ryan Coogler’s impending reboot, but this revised director’s cut isn’t going to do much to move the needle or re-insert Carter into the franchise’s good graces. Then again, The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn is a testament to Carter’s unwavering commitment to this franchise, even when the odds are against him. As Father Joe would say, “Don’t give up.”

The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn premieres on Disney+ and Hulu on August 14th.

Tags:chris carter David Duchovny gillian anderson The X-Files the x-files: I want to believe The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn

Categorized:Movies Reviews