Stream On! Is Kenneth Branagh’s ‘Frankenstein’ that bad?
Maybe Branagh titled it ‘Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein’ to deflect blame?
Noted Shakespeare apologist and general literatus Kenneth Branagh (Hamlet) filmed his own, faithful, treatment of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein in 1994. The signs were encouraging; he set out to reclaim Shelley’s story from the likes of Hollywood’s James Whale, who had filmed it in 1931 and 1935, taking liberties with the source text but still managing to produce two brilliant films.
/Streaming /Amazon /🍅42% 🍿49% /Trailer /1994 /R
In the ’thirties, James Whale shifted Shelley’s action from 1818, when Frankenstein was written, to the generic fairy-tale land of Universal Studios’ “Bohemia”; that is, what American horror-film audiences reckoned Europe was like. Branagh on the other hand did all he could to indicate the exact year, short of displaying an “1818” calendar in the laboratory.
But even in the dark dank atmosphere of the 19th-century sets the actors seem too clean and creepily cheerful, as if they were in a toothpaste commercial with their glowing pearly whites. Branagh might be in a shampoo commercial—bless his heart!
Frankenstein opens at sea—the novel is written in epistolary form, but shortly describes the same scene. The script seems a good adaptation. Captain Walton (Aidan Quinn) is on an expedition to the North Pole. While his ship is trapped in ice, a frightening noise is heard and a cloaked man emerges from the mist, telling the crew to follow him with their weapons. Walton is determined to continue his expedition; the newcomer asks, “Do you share my madness?” And Victor Frankenstein (Branagh) proceeds to tell his life story—in flashback.
—Victor grows up with his adopted sister Elizabeth Lavenza. His mother dies giving birth to his brother William, and little Victor vows on her grave to find a way to conquer death. Victor and his friend Henry Clerval (Tom Hulce, Animal House) study medicine at the University of Ingolstadt under professor Shmael Augustus Waldman (John Cleese! Yes, from Monty Python and Fawlty Towers), whose notes contain information on creating life. Waldman warns Victor not to use them lest he create an abomination. Verily, forsooth!
So, yada yada, Waldman is murdered by a patient who is subsequently hanged. Using the killer's body and Waldman's brain, Victor builds a creature (Robert De Niro already! What’re you lookin’ at?) based on Waldman's notes.
So far the movie has managed to follow Shelley’s novel while producing a bit of a slog with uneven pacing (in addition to all those teeth). I’ve read Shelley’s novel, and while it was about as flowery as James Fenimore Cooper (very), it moved along pretty steadily.
But watching this movie, at regular intervals, something hit me—some longueur, or the persistent toothpaste commercials, or … De Niro. His performance, what we can see of it under the makeup, is quite good—until he speaks. Yes, Shelley’s monster did learn to talk, but not with a growly Noo Yawk accent.
One more shocker: Frankenstein’s fiancée, his adoptive sister (alright...), is played by Helena Bonham Carter (The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, Fight Club, The Crown), who can move the center of gravity around a scene without even trying. She owns the camera whenever she’s on, and at the end, that’s a shame.
But is it “that bad?” No; it’s still quirky enough that I had a good time watching it. Your mileage may vary, but one only lives once—generally.
Sources include Wikipedia (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License).
Pete Hummers is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to earn fees by linking Amazon.com and affiliate sites. This adds nothing to Amazon's prices. This column originally appeared on The Outer Banks Voice.