There are a few directors whose names, when attached to a film, make it a must-see on the big screen. Guillermo Del Toro is one of them. Del Toro continues to make a career out of depicting monsters with more humanity than people. And with FRANKENSTEIN, he creates his most empathetic character yet.
FRANKENSTEIN is a gorgeous love letter to horror, romance, monsters, and men obsessed with their ideas. It’s a brilliant, uneven take on the classic monster that might just be the best version audiences have ever seen. When I write that, I’m not saying this is a perfect movie. It’s more that Frankenstein has always been part of various monster universes, with lore attached to him. Yet his main films (for all their monster innovation) have come off as just okay. This is the first time I’ve seen a FRANKENSTEIN film zap a jolt of electricity into a once-dead plot, bringing it back to life.
FRANKENSTEIN is Del Toro’s second passion project with Netflix. His first was PINOCCHIO, which was a 20-year labor of love. For FRANKENSTEIN, Del Toro has been trying to tell this story on the big screen for 30 years. And that passion bleeds off the screen. On the subject of passion projects, how many times have we seen directors make a film that they’ve wanted to do for years, and it comes off flat? We have Spielberg’s THE FABELMANS, Darren Aronofsky’s THE FOUNTAIN, Martin Scorsese’s SILENCE, and most recently, Francis Ford Coppola’s MEGALOPOLIS. Whereas, FRANKENSTEIN is up there with the best passion project of all-time – George Miller’s MAX MAX: FURY ROAD.
So what makes this version of everyone’s favorite monster stand tall above the rest? It’s Del Toro’s favorite theme about love, which he also depicted in PINOCCHIO: “The essence of love is not transformation, it’s acceptance.” That concept is at the heart of the relationships between Victor (Oscar Isaac) and the monster (Jacob Elordi), Henrich (Christoph Waltz) and life, and Elizabeth (Mia Goth) and the freedom of choice. Each dynamic is beautifully realized as the characters search for “acceptance.” Also, good lord, this is some fantastic acting. Elordi’s Oscar-worthy turn as the monster is sure to garner all the attention, yet amongst the other leads, there isn’t a flaw. And I’m not even mentioning David Bradley, who makes the Creature’s Tale worth watching.
If “an idea is a building, and if you go through the front door, it’s boring.” Del Toro has made a career of avoiding boredom in his work. However, with those risks sometimes comes flawed near-masterpieces, and FRANKENSTEIN is one of them. In some of the first and second parts, the film slows down too much for extended character monologues delivered in period-piece stiffness. This unravels all the monstrous fun that came before it. This is a minor nit, as even within these sequences, there’s so much to look at from a technical perspective (sound, score, set design, costumes, make-up, etc.).
Final Thought: Most of the time, Halloween films are about people (and monsters) who are hurt, searching for love. They can be looking for it via gruesome violence or unhealthy obsessions. With FRANKENSTEIN, audiences see that Del Toro was obsessed with this monster. It shines so brightly that, despite its shortcomings, it’s a retelling worth being brought back to life by today’s modern master of horror – Guillermo Del Toro.
It’s available in limited theaters now through 11/07, before it heads to Netflix.
