‘The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn’ Review – An Insubstantial Re-Edit of A Fundamentally Flawed Film

David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson | Courtesy 20th Century Studios/Fox

Eighteen years after its original theatrical debut, Chris Carter tries to rewrite history with a new director’s cut of 2008’s The X-Files: I Want to Believe—now with the added subtitle, Vrach Frankenshteyn. Freed from the shackles of a PG-13 rating, The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn promises horror, adventure, and a brand-new take on a much-beleaguered film. But history, as it turns out, can’t be rewritten so easily as Carter’s new revision ultimately changes very little of substance from the original theatrical cut. And so, audiences are left once again with an X-Files movie that seems promising in premise but proves disappointing in execution, and is saved only by its deliciously atmospheric setting and strong performances from Duchovny, Anderson, and Connolly.

I Want to Believe

Take a relatively average monster-of-the-week episode of The X-Files and stretch it to double its normal runtime and you’ll have I Want to Believe, a middling drawn-out thriller. After years on the run, Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) find themselves dragged back into the world of paranormal conspiracies as they embark on a search for a missing FBI agent. With little to go on other than the visions of a self-proclaimed psychic defrocked priest (Billy Connolly), Mulder and Scully find themselves in a race against time as more women turn up missing and dismembered. Who—or what—is behind these grisly crimes, and why? If the truth really is out there somewhere, then Mulder and Scully have to find it before it’s too late.

While there are some positives, I Want to Believe is a deeply ineffective film both in its original state and in its newly edited Vrach Frankenshteyn state. As a mystery, director Chris Carter and co-writer Frank Spotnitz lay their cards out on the table far too early, giving audiences the whodunnit rather quickly while merely withholding the how-dunnit and the why-dunnit. And while that often decently works within the constraints of a 45-minute episode of television, it makes for a relatively uneventful hour and a half of cinema. I Want to Believe delivers a relatively paper-thin story, devoid of any real tension. And worst of all, it’s not even really an X-File, just a macabre serial killer case whose only connection to the paranormal is a supposedly psychic priest who aids the FBI. On the whole, it’s forgettable and uninspired—not a winning combo for a theatrical X-Files endeavor.

A Few Bright Spots in the Darkness

Still, it’s not all bad. The wintry vistas of snowy West Virginia make for a suitably atmospheric thriller, offering up a sort of dreamy hellscape. Everyone always says more horror films should be set in the snow, and I Want to Believe works as the perfect Exhibit A. Similarly, Connolly delivers a haunting, effective performance as the disgraced Father Joe. He’s wholly detestable and thoroughly pathetic in immensely intriguing ways. It’s just a shame Carter and Spotnitz’s script don’t make better use of him. And then there’s Duchovny and Anderson returning as Mulder and Scully like no time has passed for them. They’re exactly as you remember them, equal parts loving and thorny all at the same time. And any chance to see a more domestic relationship between them is worth the price of entry alone—even if this new cut removes some of their more outright flirtatious moments.

The Vrach Frankenshteyn of It All

As for Carter’s much-touted re-edit, it ends up being much ado about nothing. Allegedly, it’s a darker, more gruesome affair; more frightening horror movie than the theatrical cut’s restrained tendencies might’ve allowed. But in practice, you’d be hard-pressed to find anything significantly different here. Perhaps it’s a bit more outright violent, and perhaps it’s a bit scarier than the theatrical cut. But mostly, it’s the same movie X-Files fans saw eighteen years ago, only a bit tighter-paced this time around. Now, to be fair, the pacing does feel quite a bit better, with this new Vrach Frankenshteyn edit running roughly six minutes shorter than the film’s theatrical cut. But better pacing can only go so far, and it turns out that not even a Frankenstein-edit can fix a film as fundamentally rough as I Want to Believe is.

Final Thoughts

It’s best to go into The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn with the correct expectations. This isn’t a radical reimagining of a much-maligned film. It doesn’t fix the myriad of problems found in the theatrical cut, nor does it do anything particularly new and interesting with the material. On the whole, Vrach Frankenshteyn offers up essentially the same film audiences already saw in 2008—though, perhaps, the best version of that film there could possibly be. But fundamentally, Vrach Frankenshteyn is still I Want to Believe, for better or worse. And that’s a real letdown, especially as back in 2008, it served as the final X-Files story until the (equally disappointing but for entirely different reasons) revival series came around in the late 2010s. And now, once again, I Want to Believe serves as the final, disappointing X-Files story until Ryan Coogler’s forthcoming reboot.

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