written by David Steffen
Alvin and the Chipmunks meet Frankenstein is a 1999 straight-to-video cartoon film distributed by Universal Studios revising the version of the title characters from the 1983-1990 TV show. Three child-sized anthromorphic chipmunks Alvin (Ross Bagdasarian Jr) , Simon (Ross Bagdasarian Jr), and Theodore (Janice Karman), live with their adopted dad/manager Dave (Ross Bagdasarian Jr).
It is part of a short series of revival films, one of which has been previously reviewed: Alvin and the Chipmunks Meet the Wolfman. As with that one, this one focuses on the boys coming across a class pulp era movie monster, this time Frankenstein (well, and Frankenstein’s monster).
The movie starts as the chipmunks are performing at Majestic Studios theme park and they get lost and they wander into an attraction where an actual Victor Frankenstein (Michael Bell) is laboring to create an actual Frankenstein’s monster (Frank Welker). As with the original Frankenstein’s monster, the creature is actually pretty friendly and befriends the boys, and Dr. Frankenstein has other plans.
As with the previous one, the title kindof gives away any possible suspense that there might have been about what was going to happen, and though some unexpected things did happen those things seemed unrelated to the Frankenstein plot at all, and so were just kind of… baffling? It’s an okay movie with some catchy numbers, might be worth watching with the kids if you see it streaming.