Subject: REVIEW: MARY SHELLEY'S FRANKENSTEIN

From: [email-masked] (Mark R. Leeper)
Date: Mon, 7 Nov 1994 20:52:42 GMT

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		        MARY SHELLEY'S FRANKENSTEIN
		      A film review by Mark R. Leeper
		       Copyright 1994 Mark R. Leeper

          Capsule review:  Unevenly-paced rendition of the
     famous horror story takes far fewer liberties than most
     versions, but still does not really deserve to call
     itself "Mary Shelley's."  Kenneth Branagh has a few
     bizarre images worth seeing, but much of his film lacks
     the spark really to capture the imagination of general
     audiences.  Fans of the story, however, will find the
     film rewarding.  Rating: low +2 (-4 to +4) (This review
     contains spoilers for people who do not already know the
     plot of the original novel.  I don't believe they would
     hurt the enjoyment of the film, but reader discretion is
     advised.)

     The novel FRANKENSTEIN has been filmed in at least eleven previous
English-language versions (listed at the end of this review).  But
perhaps it is more accurate to say that it has failed to be filmed for
nine of those versions.  Most adaptations take only an idea or two from
the novel.  They stitch those ideas together with ideas more from the
filmmaker in attempts to infuse the story with the spark of life on the
screen.  The problem is that the novel has almost no visually dramatic
images beyond that of the creature itself.  The original novel shies
away from describing in any detail the process for creation.  This is
in part because Frankenstein, who in the novel tells the story, does
not want to give away the secret.  It also worked out conveniently for
the teenaged Mary Shelley, who had only a slight acquaintance with
science and could not realistically describe such a process herself.
As a result the novel, while exciting, is extremely non-visual.
DRACULA, on the other hand, was written by a man in the theater
professionally, and that horror novel is extremely dramatic visually.
The treatment DRACULA has gotten at the hands of filmmakers is far more
shameful since a filmmaker has much more to work with.

     But in adapting FRANKENSTEIN to the screen a filmmaker is always
faced with the dilemma that the more accurate a film version is to the
book, the more ponderous and less dramatic the film must be.  Calvin
Floyd's VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN (TV title: TERROR OF FRANKENSTEIN) is the
only version I would call a faithful adaptation of the novel.  But that
film, an ambitious Swedish-Irish co-production, turned out impenetrably
static and dull even for a Swedish film. Dan Curtis made a middlingly
faithful version for television in 1972, and most other filmmakers have
not even tried to be faithful to the book, either because of the nature
of the book or because they have just been sure that they could improve
on Shelley.  But adapting this novel to the screen in a way that is
both faithful and entertaining is a real puzzle comparable to, say,
giving modern audiences something they can enjoy from Shakespearean
plays like HENRY V or MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

     So Kenneth Branagh has taken on the ambitious task of adapting
FRANKENSTEIN to the screen in a reasonably faithful manner.  Sadly,
this film will not be his crowning achievement, but it is not a
disaster either.  People looking for excitement on the screen and
people who wanted to see Shelley's novel accurately done will probably
agree that this movie is just okay, but nothing great.  But, in fact,
Branagh has a sort of a moral victory on both fronts.  He perhaps has
created the second most faithful screen adaptation and still has
managed to make it moderately entertaining.  And fans of the horror
film will find he has infused some of the most interesting and bizarre
original visual images since James Whale did the 1931 version.

     The script does take liberties with the original story but
generally these changes show the expert hand of Frank Darabont as the
co-writer.  Darabont, who wrote and directed THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION,
has a remarkable ability to see minor strategic revisions to a story
that have maximum impact in improving the resulting story.  For
example, modern readers of the novel are usually surprised that
Frankenstein is not more concerned when his creature escapes and
disappears.  By the minor addition of setting the creation during a bad
cholera epidemic, the script explains how Frankenstein is able to find
"parts" as plentiful as he does, adds some visually exciting street
scenes, and explains why Frankenstein had reasonable motivation for
believing that his escaped creature will perish on his own.  The
epidemic is a very minor liberty which pays major dividends to the
story-telling.  With the exception of purists, most people should
appreciate that the story works better with the change.  There is a
sequence toward the end of the film that is a major departure from the
novel.  It picks up the interest in a section of the story that would
be slow and pays homage to another cinematic Frankenstein story.

     Generally Branagh's style in telling the classic story is to take
less dramatic scenes in the novel and to goose them up so that they are
considerably more engaging in film version.  For example, while the
ship in the framing story just quietly gets locked by ice, the film
version has an exciting scene of the ship foundering as the ice closes
in on it while in the background huge icebergs rear out of the water.
Time and again this film has scenes from the novel but gives them more
dramatic interpretations, which is exactly what the story needed.
Scenes that would normally have some dramatic impact, like the creation
scene, are further energized by short quick cuts.

     In fact, the creation scene is a study all by itself.  The
laboratory that is the setting seems strangely organic instead of
mechanistic as is the case in many film versions.  Mammoth bags of
electric eels pulsate over the body.  As we approach the instant of
creation Branagh uses a frenzy of shorter and shorter cuts, then at the
instant of the creation the pace changes to a long languorous shot.  I
assume the male readers will understand what just that particular
pacing has to do with the act of creating life.  It is amazing what you
can do with editing.  Moments later we see the creature pulled from its
watery artificial womb amid a torrent of spilling fluid, again a very
powerful birth image.  The laboratory mechanisms are as bizarre for us
today as Kenneth Strickfaden's electrical gizmos and Jack Pierce's neck
bolts must have been to 1931 audiences.  Whatever faults the film might
have, and it certainly has them, the creation sequence makes up for.

     The set design is often sumptuous.  Much of what we see of
Frankenstein's palatial family home takes place in a huge front hall
dominated by a mammoth stairway that is at once both beautiful and
dangerous-looking, another very symbolic image.  Street scenes have a
realistic feel.

     Some of the script touches seem not well thought-out.  It is
tempting to say these touches were made after Darabont's work since
they seem uncharacteristic of the care he seems to take with a script,
but of course there is no way to tell for sure.  At one point
Frankenstein writes in his journal that in the morning he will destroy
this journal.  So why is he bothering to write?  Did he have a surfeit
of ink?  In another sequence Frankenstein is standing in the middle of
his home's enormous empty front lawn.  He turns to the house, but from
nowhere we see the previously undetected creature reach out his hand
and grab Frankenstein.  What did he do, burrow up from underground?
Hoe do you sneak up on someone standing in an open field?

     Most film versions interpret the creature as a sort of zombie--the
resurrected dead.  Shelley saw the creature more as a baby in the
artificially-created body of a large and powerful man.  Branagh really
gives the creature both aspects and walks a tightrope between them,
much as the Karloff films did.  The creature sees the world with fresh
eyes, but can draw on memories of a former life.  Branagh's version has
Frankenstein initially inspired by the wish to bring his mother back
from the dead, so he himself thinks of his work as resurrection as much
as it is creation.  In another departure in interpretation, Shelley's
creature was powerfully strong, but only humanly so.  Branagh's version
chooses to give him superhuman strength.  Most film versions do this,
of course, but VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN and the Dan Curtis version do not.

     As Frankenstein, Branagh is intense and angry.  Unlike the moody
Colin Clive or even Peter Cushing, Branagh is vital and alive in the
role.  Top billing goes to Robert De Niro as the creature.  It is a
casting decision that I still do not understand, unless it was a role
that De Niro himself was anxious to play.  I do not think it is as hard
to play the creature well as most people think it is.  I have always
contended that it takes far more acting talent to play believably a
Georgia cotton farmer than to play Frankenstein's creature.  The
creature should have some humanity, but also some feel of being alien.
But as long as an actor gives him that, not much else he can do with
the role can be wrong.  The creature needs imposing physically--which
De Niro is not--and beyond that just has to be a good creative actor.
Except for stature problems De Niro is fine in the role, but is over-
qualified for the role that should have gone to encourage the career of
promising but less recognized actor.  The surprise of the film is John
Cleese in a rare serious role.  He is terrific as an aging scientist
who could have created life himself but who lacked the final spark of
courage.  His Dr. Waldman is a man broken by his own cowardice at
taking that one last step (at least that is my interpretation).  His is
the most interesting character in the film, ironically.  Helena
Bonham-Carter is her usual pouty character as Elizabeth.  Tom Hulce is
just a little too naughty-schoolboy-ish to play Henry Clerval.

     This interpretation does not always work, but at its best it is a
vital interpretation of the Shelley book.  I would have to give
Branagh's MARY SHELLEY'S FRANKENSTEIN a low +2 on the -4 to +4 scale.

     Previous film English language versions with the actor who played
the creature:

   - FRANKENSTEIN (1910)--Charles Ogle
   - LIFE WITHOUT SOUL (1915)--Percy Darrell Standing (I have not seen
     it)
   - FRANKENSTEIN (1931)--Boris Karloff
   - CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1957)--Christopher Lee
   - HORROR OF FRANKENSTEIN (1970)--David Prowse
   - FRANKENSTEIN (1972)--Bo Svenson
   - FRANKENSTEIN: THE TRUE STORY (1974)--Michael Sarazan
   - ANDY WARHOL'S FRANKENSTEIN (1974)--Carlo Mancini
   - VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN (a.k.a TERROR OF FRANKENSTEIN) (1975)--Per
     Oscarsen
   - FRANKENSTEIN (1984)--David Warner
   - FRANKENSTEIN (1993)--Randy Quaid

					Mark R. Leeper
					[email-masked]