Our ongoing series reviewing the greatest Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror movies. Note that these reviews may contain spoilers.
Directed By: James Whale
Produced By: Carl Laemmle, Jr. & E.M. Asher
Written By: Garrett Fort, Francis Edward Faragoh, John L. Balderston (stage play), Peggy Webling (stage play), Mary Shelley (novel), Robert Florey (uncredited), John Russell (uncredited)
Starring: Colin Clive, Boris Karloff, Mae Clarke, Edward Van Sloan, Dwight Frye
Original Release: 1931
Reviewed By: Aaron Hammonds
Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars (Highest Rating)
Synopsis: If you don’t know this, shame on you. Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive), a brilliant yet erratic young scientist, discovers the process by which he can endow a body he has created out of pieces from corpses with life. His assistant, Fritz (Dwight Frye), has unfortunately supplied Frankenstein’s creation with an abnormal brain from a murderer, leading to said creation becoming a murderous monster. Frankenstein’s mentor, Dr. Waldman (Edward Van Sloan) urges his pupil to destroy the Monster, but Frankenstein insists on trying to educate him. Everything comes to a head on the day of Frankenstein’s wedding to his love Elizabeth (Mae Clarke), when the Monster’s rampage brings creator & creation together in a battle to the death.
Review/Commentary: In February 1931, Universal scored a major hit with Tod Browning’s adaptation of Bram Stoker’s classic horror novel Dracula, starring Bela Lugosi. Universal’s resident Man of a Thousand Faces, Lon Chaney, had died in late 1930 and the studio was anxious to capitalize on Lugosi’s newfound horror stardom and wanted to promote him as the “new Chaney.” To that end, Universal began scouting for a new horror project as a follow-up to Dracula; they settled on Mary Shelley’s seminal 1818 masterpiece, Frankenstein.
The studio briefly flirted with French director Robert Florey helming the film with Lugosi as the Monster. After a two-reel screen test which elicited more laughter than chills, Florey was replaced with a British director recently moved to Hollywood, James Whale (already becoming one of the most important directors at Universal). Whale and studio vice president Carl Laemmle Jr. agreed that Lugosi was the wrong actor for the part and that Florey’s script was in dire need of help (more on that later). According to Hollywood legend, Whale was sitting in the Universal commissary when he spotted a little-known character actor named Boris Karloff across the room. Beckoning him over, Whale reportedly told Karloff, “Your face has startling possibilities…” The rest is cinematic history.
Assuming you know the story, let’s discuss the film itself, starting with the performances. Colin Clive is incredible in the title role; Clive’s Henry Frankenstein is the perfect balance of a brilliant scientist driven to the brink of insanity by his awe-inspiring discovery, the process by which man can bestow life upon the lifeless, and the ability to keep himself grounded in order to hunt down his creation once it shows its murderous nature. Mae Clarke is brilliantly understated in the role of Frankenstein’s fiance, Elizabeth; while definitely underused in the film, she still manages to convey a quiet strength, fighting to pull Henry away from his destructive obsession. Edward Van Sloan, who had played Dr. Van Helsing, elderly vampire hunter, in Dracula, portrays Dr. Waldman, Henry’s medical school professor; the roles are quite similar, giving Van Sloan a niche as the elderly expert on the monster du jour in several Universal monster films. Dwight Frye, another hold-over from Dracula, turns in a riveting performance as Frankenstein’s sadistic lab assistant Fritz, stealing virtually every scene in which he appears. For comic relief, we have Frederick Kerr in a hilarious performance as Henry’s elderly father, Baron Frankenstein. The true standout performance, of course, is Karloff as the Monster; it is one of the great silent performances of cinema history. By resisting the temptation to overact or make the character larger than life, Karloff’s Monster is in fact the most human and sympathetic character in the entire film.
While not an onscreen performer, an equally important contribution to the film’s success was made by Jack Pierce, who Boris Karloff called on more than one occasion “the best make-up man in the world.” Pierce and Karloff worked together for approximately four months creating the look of the Monster (remember, these were the days before digital; the very concept of special effects was in its infancy), and that was after Pierce had spent two to three months doing research in anatomy and electrodynamics. Pierce was an eccentric but brilliant artist, responsible of the looks of all the classic Universal monsters (Dracula, Frankenstein’s Monster, the Bride of Frankenstein, the Mummy, the Wolf-Man).
The story itself is intensely boiled down from the original novel; Shelley’s highly articulate Creature is a mute, lumbering, semi-intelligent Monster, although thanks to Whale’s direction and Karloff’s sensitive and restrained performance, Frankenstein’s creation still manages to evoke a powerful sense of pathos. The novel is more of an epic, showing that Frankenstein’s abandonment of his “child” results, over time, in the destruction of everyone he loves; the film’s action takes place over the course of a week or two at most. In the novel, the Creature becomes a villain primarily in revenge against a society that refuses to accept him simply because of his horrific appearance, whereas the Monster of the film is shown to be prone to violence due to Fritz’s accidentally stealing a criminal brain for him instead of a normal one. Finally, the method by which Frankenstein animates his creation is left deliberately vague in the novel, while the machinery is very graphically displayed in the film (the same equipment being used in all of Universal’s Frankenstein films throughout the ’30′s & ’40′s).
As a side note, it’s important to explode one popular myth regarding Frankenstein: that it was the biggest mistake of Lugosi’s career. After the aforementioned disastrous screen test, the studio heads were anxious to replace both Florey & Lugosi; Lugosi wasn’t that difficult to usher out because he had been looking to leave the project anyway. Some say that wanting to bow out of Frankenstein was a disastrous career decision for Lugosi, pointing to Karloff’s meteoric rise to super-stardom as a result of his role in the film. This isn’t really true, however, because Lugosi wasn’t offered the same role as Karloff; in Florey’s original script, the Monster was little more than a murderous automaton, with none of the touches of gentleness or pathos brought to the character by Whale or Karloff.
As for favorite scenes, the creation scene is an obvious one; the first appearance of the Monster and his “lesson” involving a skylight; the heart-wrenching scene with the little girl (Marilyn Harris) by the lake; the final confrontation between creator & creation in the windmill. Frankenstein is a monument to the early days of film; there is just no way to say enough good things about it. Considering the twists and turns the project took on its way to the screen, it’s a miracle it was made at all. More importantly, it’s a miracle it was so damned good…
Check out Aaron Hammonds’ blog Aaron’s Movie Madness where he reviews his favorite movies.
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