Frankie & Alice (2011) Film Review

1 hr. 42 mins.

Starring: Halle Berry, Stellan Skarsgard, Phylicia Rashad, Chandra Wilson

Directed by: Geoffrey Sax

MPAA Rating: R

Critic's Rating: ** stars (out of 4 stars)

Clearly, Academy Award-winning actress Halle Berry is hungry for another bout with Oscar recognition since winning her golden statuette almost a decade ago for her tour de force turn in 2001's Monster's Ball. Sadly, her bid for Oscar glory will be mere wishful thinking as her mechanical schizophrenic psychological melodrama Frankie & Alice will prove too much to be a grandstanding, over-indulgent traumatic-pleasing drama that revisits a divisive subject matter previously explored diligently in finer, memorable fare on both the big and small screen (how about obvious recollections that scream 1957's brilliantly crafted "The Three Faces of Eve" and 1976's shocking televised "Sybil" for starters?).

One can see the artistic need for Berry to dip her toes into a seemingly challenging and thought-provoking project that cries volumes of devoted merit in a mental illness dramatization that seeks critical consensus. Sadly, Frankie & Alice is a well-meaning vanity piece for Ms. Berry (she's the star and co-producer of the film) but the manipulative feel to this personalized multiple personality disorder saga feels fraudulent in emotional range and rhythm. Curiously, Frankie & Alice feels stubbornly strained and woodenly familiar with additional reminiscing vibes from director Penny Marshall's woefully underrated 1990 film Awakenings to accompany the aforementioned dramatic ditties that this slight albeit demanding suspense fable wants to echo so poignantly.

Director Geoffrey Sax ("White Noise") and a handful of screenwriters conceived the sketchy resonant Frankie & Alice which is mind-boggling considering how thin and thorny the material is in content and familiarity. Again, one can imagine how ambitious and opportunistic Berry was to delve into a juicy role of a lifetime that practically begs for special attention that may tap into the performer's angst-ridden resiliency. Still, the stiffened sentimentality feels annoyingly forced and never quite settles down the over-extended pathos being perpetrated in this low grade character study.

Berry stars as Frankie Murdoch, a top money-making caged go-go dancer in a seedy LA strip club. She is great at what she does in reference to the titillating nature of her physical prowess as she hypnotizes her loyal hormonal patrons. However, the seductive grinding in the club setting doesn't begin to explain her psychotic mood swings and erratic behavior at hand. True, Frankie is extremely desired by her clientele and considered a solid motivator by her co-workers and peers. But there is one main obstacle that she cannot overcome...her unexplained blackout episodes that persistently get her in conflict with the police. Frankie has no concept as to why she gets in so much trouble and lacks any memory of her mischievous misdeeds.

Subsequently, these misconduct lapses lands the bewildered Frankie Murdoch in a recommended hospitalization environment. Onlookers are confused by Frankie's inner demons including her mother Edna (Phylicia Rashad, "For Colored Girls"), taunting younger sister Maxine (Chandra Wilson from TV's "Grey's Anatomy") as well as her bosses at the club.

The film does hark back to the late 50's where a vulnerable Frankie was raised in the intolerant and restrictive South-most likely an unkind foundation that has recklessly shaped the disillusioned dancer now struggling with her suppressed feelings of anguish and incompletion. Thankfully, Dr. Oswald (Stellan Skarsgard) is the mental hospital shrink that takes an intensified interest in the damaged dancer as he attempts to resolve her confined, scarred psyche. The diagnosis is final as Dr. Oswald has determined his unsettling pretty patient as suffering from multiple personality disorder.

Among Frankie's pesky personalities that haunt her include a slutty foul-mouthed chick, an underprivileged child and a garrulous genius. The noticeable dominating trait, however, comes in the form of Alice-a white racist society woman that spews random vitriol at will. Dr. Oswald needs time to tackle the deepened demons that plague the curvaceous lost woman but he's up against the clock as budget-minded administrators are showing impatient signs of Frankie's expensive treatment within their poorly funded medical institution.

The trumped-up tension that persists in Frankie & Alice is managed so surgically that one is invited to grab at the latest heartstring-inducing hysteria caused by Berry's perplexed protagonist being bombarded with whatever convenient caustic moment blocking her problematic path. From an indifferent mother that denies her daughter's increased mental plight to a backstory that involves Frankie's forbidden love life back in the deep South to the current-day malaise that finds the battered woman roaming the nasty streets as she finally lays down in a fetal position in the middle of busy traffic, Frankie & Alice aimlessly pours it on thick like sweetened molasses on cushioned pancakes.

Berry is soundly moving in her role but sometimes one cannot help noticing the blunt gimmickry behind her turn as a wayward woman at the crossroads. Berry's Frankie Murdoch wants us to experience the urgency of her mentally sick alter egos all cramming her tattered soul with calculating chaos but this whole affair is racked with a stilted Lifetime cable channel sentimentality-mildly interesting in concept but not sustainable enough to justify this weepy-eyed production as anything remotely conveying a major motion picture worth investing any hard-earning box office bucks. Although earnest in its traveled road for examining the human condition, Frankie & Alice is a revolving door for trivialized soul-searching antics.

The intention for startling revelations that befall a wandering woman lost in a submission of pain and elusive approval is warranted with soulful forethought but in the long run Frankie & Alice need to come together as a true and original individualized conception of floating frailties.