Pwaters' Month of Terror Day 5: Frankenstein

Hello ladies, gentlemen, and creatures lurking in the shadows!  This month, October, is a favorite among horror fans, such as myself.  My goal for the next 31 days is to share with you the scariest and best of the genre.  The films will range from old school classics to modern day gorefests (they won't be in any particular order).  So scout these movies out, grab a bag of popcorn (or a blood bag) and enjoy!


Frankenstein (1931)

Dir. James Whale

Of all the "classic" Universal monster movies (of which include Dracula, The Wolf Man, The Mummy, etc), I consider James Whale's adaptation of Mary Shelley's book to be the best.  I think what makes it scary is that the actual monster is created by man.  The monster is just a laboratory mistake, initiated when Frankenstein's assistant fucks up and drops the "normal" brain and has to use an "abnormal" brain.  The ability to effectively "play god" and create life is kind of scary if you think about it - especially if the one creating life is an off-his-rocker scientist (when his monster first shows signs of life, Dr. Frankenstein exclaims "Now I know what it is like to be God!").

Enough can't be said about Boris Karloff's performance.  After Universal's huge success with Dracula, it was originally planned to have Bela Lugosi play the monster in Frankenstein - luckily he backed down because now we have one of the best horror performances of all time. It's hard to put into words how good it is; it's much more complex than it ever needed to be. Karloff taps into some sort of bizarre basic primal human snarling type thing and every second he's on screen is mesmerizing.  And also Jack Pierce's legendary make-up design for Karloff is undoubtedly one of the best of all time (that's just what we automatically think of when we hear "frankenstein").  It's said that Karloff had to endure four hours under Pierce's hand to put on the make-up, but I'd say it was worth every second to create one of cinema's best horror icons.

One of my favorite scenes in the movie (and the most controversial) is when the monster escapes the lab and wanders into the nearby village.  He finds a little girl picking the petals off of flowers and gently tossing them into the river.  He joins in with her and for the first time, we see the creature bonding with someone else; however, when the monster runs out of petals, he cannot make the distinction between the petals and the little girl, and he tosses her into the river against her will and drowns her.  This scene had been altered or plain cut out of many of the original screenings because it was deemed too upsetting to audiences.