Frankie Freako

Frankie Freako is designed to melt your brain. The only question is whether you might welcome such cerebral liquefaction or not.

While the film clearly plays as an homage to the kinds of kid-friendly, horror-adjacent comedies that ruled the ’80s, its charming commitment to a premise whose asininity borders on trolling makes Frankie Freako a distinctly 21st century product.

A self-consciously juvenile pizza party of a movie that's lots of fun if you don’t take it too seriously.

The joke is delivered by way of some genuinely inspired puppetry and some cheaply produced but cleverly devised digital effects.


If you can imagine 'Gremlins' having a torrid one-night stand with 'Drop Dead Fred,' this would be their love child.

This is a movie meant to feel like it belongs on the shelf of a video store, circa 1989, evoking ultra low budget Gremlins knock offs. It's purposely shlocky and sometimes feels like it's trying too hard but also frequently funny and endearing.

As a rabid fan of these films, I’ve been very excited to see what Kostanski’s take would be, and its part update and part homage, that feels like the kind of film you’d watch at a pizza party sleepover in the 90s. 


I loved some of the Canadian filmmakers’ prior genre-spoofing projects, like Psycho Goreman and Manborg…this one, not so much, though admittedly viewers who grew up watching its inspirations will probably find it a riot.

What could be a shallow exercise in empty nostalgia is elevated by the sheer amount of effort put into Frankie Freako.

Frankie Freako is an affectionate riff on a very particular kind of movie, but its screwball charms and imagination make it more than just a broad parody...